ALCOTT'S NEW SERIES. 



FAMILIAR LETTERS 

TO 



YOUNG MEN 



YAE1GUS SUBJECTS. 



DESIGNED AS A 

Cnmpitnra to tip ^ntntg Mm y %J&^> 

r 

BY ' I;" 



WM. A. ALCOTT, 

AUTHOR OF THE ' YOUNG MOTHER,' ' YOUNG HUSBAND,' 
ETC., ETC. 



BUFFALO : 

GEO. H. DERBY & COMPANY. 

1849. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S49, 

By JOHN F. TROW, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of 



New-York. 



John F. Trow, 

Printer and Stereotyper, 

49 Ann-street, N. Y. 



TO THE READER, 



In the Preface to the " Young Man's Guide," first edition, 
the reader may find the following paragraph, which will 
be a sufficient apology— if apology is needed— for the 
appearance of the present volume. 

" Nor is it to be expected that a work of this size would 
make the lofty pretensions of embracing every thing 
which it is necessary for young men to know and practise 
in order to become useful, virtuous and happy, in all the 
relations of life. A few topics only have been presented ; 
and those with a brevity which, I fear, will detract from 
their importance. Should the work, however, meet the 
approbation of those for whom it is intended, and be a 
means of improving their character, it is not improbable 
that another volume, embracing several other important and 
interesting topics which were necessarily excluded from 
this, may hereafter be attempted." 

Now if the sale of about 50,000 of the " Young Man's 
Guide," during the past fifteen years, requires that I 
should redeem the pledge thus publicly and voluntarily 



4 TO THE READER. 

given, I herewith make the attempt. But I do so in part 
only ; for there remains a wide range of subjects belonging 
to the department of Health and Physiology, as necessary 
to young men as any thing I have yet written ; which may 
possibly bring me, once more, before the many millions of 
a class of citizens for whom well written books, in the 
right style and spirit, are, at the present crisis, most impe- 
riously demanded. 

I should also observe, in this place, that some of the fol- 
lowing letters, in a crude form, have already appeared in the 
columns of the New-York Evangelist and other papers and 
journals. In the present case, however, they are consider- 
ably altered, amended, and, as I trust, improved. 

THE AUTHOR. 

West Newtcm, Mass., June, 1849. 



CONTENTS. 



LETTER I. 

PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 

The Author's Apology — Young Men do not aim high enough — Re- 
sponsibilities of the Young Men of America— Their peculiar situa- 
tion — Young men the rulers of our land — The tendencies of the 
Arts and Sciences, and of Civilization, . . . .13 

LETTER II. 

SELF-RESPECT AND SELF-REVERENCE. 

Another Apology— What Addison has said— Hint from History— Sub- 
lime heights to which Young Men might attain — Appeal, . . 22 

LETTER III. 

SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 

Self-Knowledge greatly facilitated by Self-Reverence— What Watts 
says— Some of the evils of Self-Ignorance— Our threefold nature — 
Apology for the condition of the young at present — Erroneous edu- 
cation — An elegant extract — Another appeal — Aids to self-know- 
ledge—The Bible an important one, . . . . .28 

LETTER IV. 

SELF-DEPENDENCE. 

Self-Dependence and Self- Confidence compared— Illustrated by Anec- 
dote — Can hardly be in excess — Effects of Riches and Poverty on 
Self-Dependence— Agur's Prayer— Favorable influence of Republi- 
canism on Self-Dependence, . . . . , ,42 



D CONTENTS. 

LETTER V. 

SELF-EDUCATION. 

Harmony of Character— The Balance— The Young to be men in 
miniature — Condition of Society — Difficulties in the way — Moral 
Views— The Young Man of Nazareth, . . . . h2 

LETTER VI. 

HARMONY OF CHARACTER. 

Analysis of the Human Being— Comparison— A great law — The War 
within — Effects of divided labor — Errors of the schools — A word of 
scriptural encouragement to Young Men, . . . .61 

LETTER VII. 

SELF-INSTRUCTION. 

The Keys of knowledge — A comparison— The Ancient Athenians- 
Anecdotes of Self-Instructed Young Men — Young Men have time 
and means— Errors in regard to reading— Reading at late hours, 71 

LETTER VIII. 

LIGHT READING. 

Definition of Terms — Reading by Snatches — Newspaper Reading — 
Reading in fragments — Facts — Depraved taste — Caution required — 
Right and duty of choice — History and Geography recommended to 
Young Men— Why— Particular examples, . . . .78 

LETTER IX. 

CORRECT CONVERSATION. 

The study of Grammar a failure— Examples— How to acquire the 
habit of correct conversation— Writing— Composing— Grammar 
afterward, . . . . . . . .90 

LETTER X. 

THE SCHOOLS. 

The author not an enemy of schools— Proofs adduced— Defects of the 
schools — What they might become — Young Men exhorted not to 
forsake them, but to make them better, . . .97 



CONTENTS. 7 

LETTER XL 

THE LOVE AND SPIRIT OF PROGRESS. 

Not taught in the schools— Hungering and thirsting for Progress — 
Mere knowledge — A mother — Quotation from Burgh — Value of 
this trait in human character—A charge to the young, . . 103 

LETTER XII. 

LOVE of inquiry; or, free-thinking. 

Definition of terms— Free-thinking not the same as skepticism— Lord 
Bacon's remark — An anecdote — Exhortation to Young Men — John 
Robinson's remarkable advice to the Puritans— What books and 
men are to be avoided— Anecdote of one of Paine's books— Reflec- 
tions, . . . . . . . . .11 

LETTER XIH. 

RIGHT USE OF OURSELVES. 

Knowing ourselves— How ignorant we are of ourselves— Greater 
ignorance than this — What it is — Examples of Self-Ignorance — 
Transforming power of a right knowledge of ourselves, . . 118 



LETTER XIV. 

PHYSIOLOGY. 

What I mean by Physiology — Public prejudices against it— How 
these prejudices are best met — What Young Men are to do in this 
matter — Lectures — Books — Right use of Lectures— Consequences — 
immediate and remote — of examining this subject, . . .152 



LETTER XV. 

PHRENOLOGY. 

Popular interrogatories— The writer's reply— Phrenology recommend- 
ed — Every thing to be made practical — Open to conviction — My 
own observation and experience— Effects of Physiology and Phre- 
nology on society, . . . . . . .133 



b CONTENTS. 

LETTER XVI. 

PHYSIOGNOMY. 

The term Physiognomy— My experience once more— Results— Anec- 
dotes—The human face an index of the soul, . . .183 



LETTER XVII. 

TRAVELLING. 

Fondness of Young Men for Travelling — Modes of Travel which are 
unprofitable — Note on cigars and cigar smoking — Right use of 
Travelling— Rules — Travel with your eyes open — With memoran- 
dum book and pencil — On sketching objects — Relating what we 
have seen— Reading while travelling— Walking— Eminent walkers 
— Cautions — My own experience — Anecdote of Mr. Woodbridge, 141 

LETTER XVIII. 

CONSCIENTIOUSNESS. 

Is there much Conscientiousness in the world— Cases of conscience 
— Conscience in daily life — What to be Conscientious about — Anec- 
dote of an Errorist — W T hat Reason says— What Revelation — Mis- 
takes of Christians— Reflections, ..... 151 

LETTER XIX. 

LOVE OF EXCITEMENT. 

What I mean by excitement — Universal fondness for it — Voice of 
experience— How far experience will go— One general direction — 
And one general law— Facts or proofs on which that law is based — 
Appeal to Young Men on behalf of Temperance, . . .168 

LETTER XX. 

ON PURITY. 

An anecdote— Paley and Timothy on Purity— Paul to the Romans 
— Eastern notions generally — The punishment of impurity — Its 
varied forms — Punishment of impurity hereafter — Our Saviour's 
views— Sources of impurity — 1. Too much heat, external and in- 
ternal— 2. Undue mental excitement— 3. Impurity itself— What 
Young Men of twenty-five ought to know— Evils of bad associates, 169 



CONTENTS. VJ 

LETTER XXL 

MODELS AND MODEL CHARACTER. 

Study of Biography — Young Men imitative — How Biography may 
be useful to them— Anecdotes for illustration— Opinions of Rush and 
Franklin — Jesus Christ the great model man, . . . 180 

LETTER XXII. 

DECISION AND FIRMNESS. 

John Foster on Decision — Extracts from Mudie — Examples of Deci- 
sion of Character — Napoleon — Ledyard — Washington — General 
remarks, . . . . . . . . .187 

LETTER XXIII. 

SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 

Setting up too early in life— Its consequences— Pecuniary loss— Effects 

on the health — Pres. Humphrey's views — Anecdote of young I 

of Boston — Reasoning with Young Men on the subject — Hasty 
estimates of our yearly loss, ...... 191 

LETTER XXIV. 

MONEY-GETTING. 

Every Young Man may be a Girard or an Astor— Love and hatred of 
money — Extremes— How far the love of money should influence us 
— The gospel principle of doing business illustrated — Our Saviour 
the great example, ....... 203 

LETTER XXV. 

PLEASURE SEEKING. 

All (the young included) seek happiness— Holiness before happiness 
— Young Men should make holiness the road to happiness— Error 
of the young — Evils of saying, I don't care, .... 211 

LETTER XXVI. 

MENTAL EXCITANTS. 

Meaning of my terms— Character of many modern libraries— Novels 
— Licentious publications— Some of our bookstores in fault— Coun- 
sels to the young on excitement, - 219 



10 CONTENTS. 

LETTER XXVII. 

RESPECT FOR AGE. 

Recollections of tne past ; at the family ; at the schoolroom ; at col- 
lege ; at the sanctuary— The present contrasted with the past— Ex- 
tremes to be avoided — In general obey the customs of society — 
Young Men cautioned — The dangerous season — Divine Providence 
to be heeded— Counsels of age, . . . . 229 

LETTER XXVIII. 

DUTIES TO THE AGED. 

The old to be regarded as relics of a past age — Reasons why — The 
young apt to slight the old — A general rule — Violations of this rule 
— What I have seen — How the old may benefit the young — The 
young should avail themselves of their assistance — A difficulty — 
How met and overcome — Allusion to the spirit of insubordination 
in modern times, ....... 243 

LETTER XXIX. 

POLITICS AND POLITICAL DUTIES. 

Scylla and Charybdis — The blusterer — Want of conscientiousness in 
this matter— This a great error in politics— Exalted privilege of 
Deing an American young man — Duty it involves — Duty of under- 
standing one's own country— Redeeming our time— Error in read- 
ing, 252 

LETTER XXX. 

FEMALE SOCIETY. 

Man not a solitary being— Destined to conjugal life— Mutual Influence 
of the sexes — Appeal to Young Men — Wrong impressions corrected 
—The Terra del Fuego of human life— Moral lessons and reflec- 
tions, . . . . . . . . . 262 

LETTER XXXI. 

GENERAL DUTY OF MARRIAGE. 

Matrimony a duty— At what age— Man hardly free in this respect- 
Motives to this duty— Common excuses for neglecting it — These ex- 
cuses met — Adaptation of character — Particular remarks concern- 
ing age, . . . . . . . . .271 



CONTENTS. 11 

LETTER XXXII. 

RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 

The young apt to be skeptical— Healthy tendency of Religion— Re- 
pentance healthy— So is Faith— Skepticism unfavorable to health 
and longevity— The proof— Health of our Saviour and of Paul, 283 

LETTER XXXIII. 

THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 

" Belief safe " — Is it so — Error exposed — Religion to be sustained by 
facts and evidence — One evidence of its truth, that it is favorable to 
health— Objections to this view considered, .... 294 

LETTER XXXIV. 

DEATH AND FUTURITY. 

Speculation on this subject — A common error — Just views of death- 
Nothing blotted out— Death a mere change— But of what— Not of 
character — Not so certainly of place — Everlasting progress — Man 
made to soar — We should think more on this subject — Life, and its 
responsibilities— California— A richer land than California— Its de- 
sirableness — All kings and priests there, and all rich — Young Men 
exhorted to seek it, 303 



LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 



LETTER L 

PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 

In addressing young men as a class, it is diffi- 
cult to fix the mind's eye on any particular age. 
There is a period — and it arrives sooner in the 
lives of some, and later in those of others— 
when they may be said to begin to act for 
themselves ; and in the common but not in- 
appropriate language of the day, to form their 
own character. They are indeed forming 
character by every action of every day of their 
lives, whether that action be of the voluntary 
or of the involuntary kind. When, however, 
in these communications, I shall speak to you 



14 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

of forming your own characters, or of educat- 
ing yourselves, reference will be had princi- 
pally to those acts which seem to be almost if 
not quite without the pale of the family, and 
beyond parental control ; — those acts in which 
and by which every young man practically 
says, " I take the responsibility." 

The prevalent custom of singling out young 
men and addressing them, has not originated 
in the belief that they arrive earlier or with 
less experience at the period of life of which I 
have been speaking than formerly — though 
this probably is the fact — but rather from the 
conviction that their responsibilities, when as- 
sumed, are more weighty. They are also be- 
lieved to be more exposed to temptation than 
formerly, both physically and morally. Be- 
sides, the world is learning at last — though 
even now very slowly — the vast superiority 
of prevention, whenever and wherever it can 
be applied, to correction or cure. 

Young men are ever inexperienced — it must 
be so in the nature of things — and therefore 
ever apt to be thoughtless. And with them, 
when they do think, the golden age stands out 



PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 15 

in the future — not as with old men, in the past. 
It is well indeed it should be so. The world 
is certainly onward — progressive — even though 
it should make but slow progress. He, then, 
who places the golden age in the future, is cor- 
rect. Besides this, young men require the 
stimulus of high hope in order to the best de- 
velopment and most favorable exercise of their 
powers and capacities. 

My counsel to the young, then, always is : 
Expect great things in the future. Expect, 
even, to do great things yourselves. It is 
necessary to aim high, were it only to accom- 
plish a little. But no young man has a moral 
right to satisfy, if he could, the desires of his 
immortal mind, and the requirements of society 
and of God, by merely expecting to accomplish 
a little. He is bound to expect much, and 
attempt much. 

Some young men have done this, to their 
honor, in every age. It is those alone who 
have thus expected and acted, who have shone 
as lights in the world. And they have had 
their reward. And what young men have 



16 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

done in the past, young men can do in the 
present and future. 

But if these counsels are adapted to young 
men generally, they are peculiarly so to those 
of United America. It is not too much to say, 
that at every period of our history as a repub- 
lic, the young have held in their own hands, 
at least prospectively, our national destinies. 
They have — practically so, at least — elected 
several of our chief magistrates already. 

Besides, in no country of the known world — 
the world past or present — have the f? counsels" 
of old men so early required the " activities" 
of the young, as in the United States. In this 
respect it is that, under the genius of civil in- 
stitutions like our own, the young may be said 
to be the rulers of the land. 

This is republicanism with twofold force. 
One might think it enough that power should 
have passed from the few to the many ; from 
the king and nobility to the subjects and 
people ; but when the crown is not only trans- 
ferred to the people, but to the young people, 
it introduces quite a new order of things. 



PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 17 

Happy, then, the people whose youthful ru- 
lers — for such the young men of our land are 
daily and hourly becoming — are duly qualified 
to rule in wisdom and in the fear of the Lord. 
But woe to that country and that people whose 
young men hearken not to the counsels of the 
old, nor rise up at their presence. Theirs may 
indeed be republicanism — the semblance of it 
— but then it is republicanism in its worst 
form. It is republicanism " with a vengeance." 

The time has been when our young men 
were treated with too much reserve, and kept 
at too great a distance ; when, in truth, not a 
few were treated more like servants and me- 
nials than like sons. But " times are altered." 
And in passing, as we now are, to the other 
extreme, it may be worth while to inquire 
whether there is not danger of going too far. 

For what means the claim which has not 
only been made in every past age but in our 
own, with a voice, as it were, of authority, that 
the old were fools, and that only "present 
times are wise V What means the tendency 
which is every where obvious, not only to use 
the young for action, but for counsel too ? Or 



18 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

has there been, of late, some new dispensation 
which changes the relation of young men, and 
without the pain of acquiring experience, im- 
parts its privileges ? 

It is said, I know, that old men not only 
forget that they themselves have once been 
young, but claim superior wisdom at the pre- 
cise time when they manifest the want of it. 
But is not this to beg the very question in de- 
bate ? Is it not to assume what the young, of 
course, cannot prove ? 

Grant that age is not always wise, or even 
experienced, is not youth, of necessity, desti- 
tute of that experience which, if it does not 
always impart wisdom, always may do it? 
And if a few old men who set up their claims 
for wisdom and experience are mere "croakers," 
are they all so ? Do not some of them still 
sympathize with childhood and youth ? And 
may not — should not — childhood and youth 
avail themselves of this sympathy ? 

I have said that the responsibilities of young 
men are more weighty than formerly. Does 
such a position need any farther elucidation ? 
If young men are, prospectively, and indeed 



PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 19 

in reality, the rulers of our land, are not their 
responsibilities weighty? Nor are they di- 
minished by the rising conviction on the pub- 
lic mind of these youthful rulers, that old men, 
of the present age, at least, are but old fools. 

Besides, it cannot be overlooked by any 
young man who takes the pains to reflect a 
moment, or even to read what I am writing, 
that if young men do hold in their hands the 
destinies of our country, they also hold in their 
hands, at the same time, the destinies of all our 
institutions, social, literary, and religious. 

I have said that you are more exposed to 
temptation, my young friends, than formerly. 
There are various reasons why this should be 
so. In the first place, your internal organiza- 
tion is less favorable for the mighty work of 
resisting temptation, than the organization of 
young men in past times. This, I must ask 
you to take, now, for granted ; reserving for 
the present the task of proving what I have 
asserted. Then, in the second place, civiliza- 
tion and refinement are on the march ; but 
these, while they place us within the range 
both of better and worse influences, according 



20 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

to our taste and option, do not necessarily give 
us greater power to resist temptation or oppose 
downward tendencies; whether these last arise 
from external circumstances, or from the inter- 
nal current of that common depravity of which 
we all partake. 

Thirdly, you are more exposed to temptation 
than young men formerly were, because you 
have more leisure than they had. I need not 
repeat to you the old adage concerning the 
prince of availables, and his readiness to make 
the idle man his workshop. In former times, 
moreover, there were fewer holidays than now, 
and those holidays were spent in a very dif- 
ferent manner. 

Lastly, it should be remembered that labor- 
saving machinery — including, of course, the 
canal, the railroad, the steamboat, and the 
telegraph — while it brings us countless bless- 
ings in its train, imparts also the power as 
well as the temptation to wrong-doing, and to 
the misrule both of your own spirits, and of 
that society over whom Providence has placed 
you. 

I asked a distinguished phrenologist, one 



PRELIMINARY REMARKS. 21 

day, why he was so apt to dwell on the good 
traits in the character of those whose heads 
he examined. His reply was, " Because it is 
needful to inspire young men with confidence 
in themselves. They do not think how much 
they might accomplish, if they would but try. 
They are wanting — the truly capable ones at 
least— in self-respect and self-reverence." 

There was truth in his remark ; and this is 
one reason why I have said so much, both 
here and elsewhere, to young men. But on 
the subject of self-reverence and self-respect, I 
must speak in my next letter. 



LETTER II. 

SELF-RESPECT AND SELF-REVERENCE. 

"I do and must reverence human nature/' 
said an eminent New England divine ; but in 
saying this the doctor exposed himself greatly 
to criticism. Indeed, I was inclined to won- 
der at the expression myself. So long and 
so justly had I regarded human nature as 
perverted and fallen, that I almost forgot that 
there were, so to speak, two sides to it ; that 
if on the one side we are allied to the worm, 
and even to the dust we tread on, it is not less 
true that we are, on the other side, allied to 
angels, and cherubs, and seraphs, and even to 
the great God himself. And yet that such is 
the fact, who will presume to deny ? 

We reverence our parents, and sometimes 



SELF-RESPECT SELF-REVERENCE. 23 

our rulers, especially when we regard them as 
ruling us in righteousness ; and is there aught 
in this to which the most fastidious or sensi- 
tive could well object? Then why should 
we shrink from the idea of reverencing hu- 
man nature ? 

For in so doing, it is not necessary that we 
should reverence human nature in all its de- 
praved forms. We only reverence it as it 
should be, and for the sake of those important 
relations and responsibilities which it was 
originally intended to sustain. We reverence 
it, in part, for the sake of the Divine image 
which was originally enstamped on it. 

For you will not doubt that we are the chil- 
dren of one common Father, or that though 
we have strayed from this Father's house we 
are still his children, and treated by him as 
such. And is not provision made — has it not 
been made these 1800 years — for restoring in 
us that resemblance to our heavenly Father 
which we have lost by our transgressions ? 

Addison, in the Spectator, has somewhere 
intimated that the time may come in eternity, 
when the meanest redeemed human soul will 



24 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

rise as much higher in the scale of moral 
excellence and glory, than the post now occu- 
pied by Gabriel, as that bright seraph is exalt- 
ed above the lowest of the Hottentots, or even 
of the savages of the wilderness. And an au- 
thority higher than Addison has said : " Eye 
hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither 
hath it entered into the heart of man to con- 
ceive the things which God hath prepared for 
them that love him." 

Think, too, of a Newton, a Franklin, or a 
Herschel. We are accustomed to regard these 
men as giants in point of intellect. And, com- 
pared with the mass of mankind around them, 
they were so. Who does not reverence them 
— their nature at the least ? Yet what were 
these men in comparison with what they 
might have been, could life have been pro- 
longed to them a thousand years, to what in 
truth they may yet become? Did they not 
think meanly of themselves, when they thought 
of the amazing heights of science which neither 
they nor any other mortals had yet climbed ? 

Yet what were Newton, La Place, Franklin, 
Cuvier, Solomon, even, considered merely as 



SELF-RESPECT SELF-REVERENCE. 25 

men of learning or as intellectual giants, when 
compared with John, and Paul, and Brainard, 
and Howard? What is mere intellectual 
greatness to moral elevation? And why 
might we not have the union of both these in 
the same individual? Suppose for once the 
union were to take place. Suppose a Paul, 
with his moral greatness, superadded to a Sir 
Isaac Newton. The thing is quite conceiv- 
able. Who would not reverence such a char- 
acter ? And is not human nature, thus eleva- 
ted, ennobled, and rendered godlike, worthy to 
be reverenced? 

But to these sublime heights, O young man 
— these portals of celestial day, as the poet 
calls them — it is your privilege no less than 
your duty to aspire. You cannot know that 
you may not, at some day, by the full develop- 
ment and cultivation of all your powers, fac- 
ulties and functions, rise to those heights, 
whence you may look down on all who have 
lived before you, and even on Gabriel and all 
the cherubim and seraphim that stand before 
the throne eternal. 

Will you not, then, learn to reverence your- 
2 



26 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

selves, or at least that wonderful nature with 
which God in his Providence has intrusted 
you ? Will you dare to degrade, in any con- 
ceivable way, a nature allied to angels and 
archangels, and to the Eternal himself? Made 
to belong to the divine family — to be among 
the sons and daughters of the Lord Almighty 
— will you presume to sink yourself to the 
level, and below the level, of the brutes that 
perish ? 

Learn then to respect — to reverence — thyself. 
Learn to reverence thyself for the sake of 
thyself. Made to be like the sons of God, 
and to dwell in their midst — nay, to be as it 
were a son of God thyself — wilt thou lose a 
single opportunity for qualifying thyself, in- 
tellectually, morally, or even physically, for 
that blest abode ? Wilt thou not exert every 
faculty and every power, to the full extent of 
those faculties and powers, to become what 
thou wilt wish hereafter thou hadst made 
thyself? 

Thyself, physically. This may seem to 
thee a riddle. But I will endeavor to make it 
more plain hereafter. In the meantime read 



SELF-RESPECT SELF-REVERENCE. 27 

the fifteenth chapter of Paul's first letter to 
his Corinthian brethren. There will be found 
a partial solution of what may, at first view, 
seem enigmatical in this particular. 

Learn, above all, to reverence thyself for the 
sake of Him who is at once thy Creator, thy 
Preserver, thy Redeemer; and what is more 
— I was going to say infinitely more — interest- 
ing, thy Father. Oh ! what a word is this, 
thy everlasting Father ! Should a son of the 
eternal God ever cease to reverence himself? 
Should he ever for one short moment forget 
his royal birth and blood? Should he not 
live and die with the highest hopes, the high- 
est aspirations, the highest self-reverence ? 



LETTER III. 

SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 

In order to reverence himself, a young man 
must first know himself. I do not mean by 
this, that he must know himself as thoroughly 
as God knows him ; for that were an impossi- 
bility. Nor do I mean to intimate that his 
knowledge of himself must be fully acquired 
at once. All I mean to affirm is, that the rev- 
erence of ourselves, which was urged in the 
last Letter, will always be graduated by our 
self-knowledge. 

True it is that a due reverence of ourselves 
would be a most commanding motive to every 
young man in the pursuit of self-knowledge. 
The maxim, or injunction, "Know thyself/' 
coming down to us, as it does, from the remo- 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 29 

test antiquity, and urged and echoed from the 
pages of all wisdom sacred and profane, strikes 
us with greater or less force in proportion as 
we are more or less acquainted already, with 
the subject to which our attention is directed. 

" To know ourselves diseased is half our 
cure," is often and well said. It is also said 
that they only who are sick, feel the need of a 
physician. Now we are all sick in this partic- 
ular, if in no other, that we are all vastly 
ignorant of ourselves. We are not very pro- 
found in the knowledge of others ; but as re- 
gards the knowledge of ourselves, we are 
greatly deficient. Here the wisest of us might 
well take lessons. 

And herein consists the greatest hinderance 
to self-knowledge, viz. ; that we do not know, 
as Dr. Watts aptly expresses it, how weak and 
unwise we are. We may acknowledge our- 
selves ignorant, at least before God ; but we 
seldom really feel our ignorance. Somehow 
or other we still cling to the idea that we are 
pretty wise, after all. 

Talk to a young man of his ignorance. If 
you are an elder, he admits it. But suppose 



30 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

you are his equal, real or supposed — what 
then ? Possibly he may seem to admit it ; but 
in the far greater majority of~ cases he will 
repel the idea ; in too many instances with 
emotions of anger, if not with violence. I 
have seen many a young man who would bear 
with composure, almost any charge, except 
that of ignorance of himself, or of his own na- 
ture. And more, still — as if to atone for their 
ignorance, will say, bloatingly, "Human na- 
ture, I think, is the greatest study, after all." 

The truth is, that the more ignorant we are, 
in this particular, the greater our confidence in 
the extent of our self-knowledge. And on the 
contrary, the more truly wise we are, the more 
clearly we perceive the depths of our igno- 
rance, on all subjects, but especially in regard 
to ourselves. One of the greatest obstacles to 
human progress, as I have already more than 
intimated, consists in this, that we are not yet 
wise and learned enough, either individually 
or collectively, to perceive the necessity of self- 
exertion, or to value its rewards. We are not 
wise enough, in other words, to know how 
ignorant we are. 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 31 

Concerning this subject — self-knowledge — 
in regard to its importance to young men, I 
feel incompetent to speak, on account of its 
magnitude. The language of Holy Writ, in 
relation to another matter, seems to repel me : 
— It is high as heaven, what canst thou do ? 
it is deep as hell, what canst thou know ? 

The young man, no less than the old one, 
has a threefold nature — is a trinity in unity — 
like his Maker. A knowledge of this great fact 
is of the first importance in the outset, because 
it involves high and important duties. If our 
nature is made up, as Paul would intimate, of 
body, soul, and spirit, or, as the moderns ex- 
press it, of physical, intellectual and moral 
powers, then in order to know ourselves cor- 
rectly, we must know something of each of 
these great departments of our nature, as well 
as of their relations to each other and to the 
beings and things around us. 

But this knowledge, so essential to the young 
man, in all past ages — and little less in the 
present — is denied him. Not, indeed, by de- 
sign, with malice aforethought, open or covert, 



32 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

but by the construction and arrangement of 
society. It is so in the nature of things. 

The first part of his nature which is recog- 
nized as worthy of cultivation, is his memory. 
At home or abroad, he is thought to be learned, 
in proportion to the load of words — the signs 
of other men's ideas — which he can be made 
to carry. And when he seems to rise to the 
cultivation of other and higher faculties, it is 
ten to one, but his instruction consists of mere 
memory work. The other faculties of our in- 
tellectual domain are undeveloped, and conse- 
quently uncultivated. 

But if the various mental faculties lie hidden 
from young men, at least for the far greater 
part, how much more so the relations of these 
faculties to each other ! Intellectual Philoso- 
phy is a term with whose meaning, even, 
young men are scarcely made acquainted. The 
dependence of a good judgment upon accurate 
perception, patient attention, careful compari- 
son, and the proper and natural association of 
our ideas, is a thing of which the young man, 
unless by sheer accident, is almost as ignorant 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 33 

as the merest savage, or as the " man in the 
moon." 

Still more rarely is it made a fundamental 
point, in early education, to watch the opera- 
tions of the mind, and learn to analyze one's 
ideas. Indeed this busy age seems altogether 
unfavorable to much reflection, so that if it 
were taught us in the schools, it would not be 
likely to thrive out of them. Steamboats, 
railroads, and electro-magnetic telegraphs are 
not in this respect very favorable. 

It is sometimes said that a person ought not 
to know, by his sensations or feelings, that he 
has a stomach. Now if it were the great 
purpose of all those who have the care of the 
young, to cultivate their minds — rather to pre- 
tend to cultivate them — in such a way that 
they may never know they have any minds, 
it would be difficult to devise a better system 
for this purpose than that which so extensively 
prevails among us. 

And then the moral part of the young man 

— does this receive any better attention than 

the intellectual ? Do the young know that 

they have a moral nature ? If so, how come 

2* 



34 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

they by the knowledge ? Is it obtainable in 
the family ? Is it found in the schools ? By 
what processes are the young, of each succes- 
sive rising generation, made to know something 
of the healthful nature and tendencies of the 
elevating affections and passions, as love, hope, 
joy, peace, cheerfulness, &c, or of the unfa- 
vorable tendency of their opposites, such as 
hatred, despondency, grief, anger, melancholy, 
&c? 

The instructions of the family, the common 
school, the high school, and the Sabbath 
school, do much for us, I admit ; but what do 
they in the way of teaching us ourselves? 
Even the Sabbath school, whose special prero- 
gative it would appear to be to unveil to us 
ourselves and our relations to our neighbor 
and to God, informs us of every thing else 
rather than this most important of all know- 
ledge. In this, even, what is told us is often 
made to play " round the head," but comes not 
to the heart." 

This omission, I admit, is not from a settled 
intention to avoid the knowledge of ourselves. 
By no means. On the other hand, however, it 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 35 

is not from a settled intention to communicate 
that knowledge. And this it is that I com- 
plain of as unworthy of the times we live in, 
and the glorious light which has risen upon 
us. The knowledge of ourselves is the foun- 
dation — or should be — of all other knowledge, 
earthly or heavenly. And it is for want of 
this knowledge, at least in part, that mankind 
are such bundles, so to speak, of inconsisten- 
cies as render human character strangely enig- 
matical, when it should be the reverse. 

Granted, however, that the young were 
trained to a knowledge of themselves, intel- 
lectually and morally, as they ought to be. 
Granted that every thing received the measure 
of attention it deserves in the two great depart- 
ments of the human domain to which I have 
adverted. Still, what is known of the physical 
part of us — the body, so fearfully and wonder- 
fully made ? What know we of its nature, 
functions, relations, and purposes ? 

We explore the vast domain of external na- 
ture, unhesitatingly. We become acquainted 
with the geography, the geology, the history 
of the world in which we live. We study 



36 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

natural history — animals, vegetables, and mi- 
nerals. To find the latter, we dig deep in the 
bowels of the earth, or perseveringly drain, as 
it were, one by one, her sands. We ascend 
the heavens, as aeronauts ; or, by aid of tele- 
scopes of mighty power, explore sun, moon, 
and stars. Or, aided by lightning speed, we 
canvass the actions of men hundreds or thou- 
sands of miles distant, if perchance we may 
understand them, and read their hearts by 
their lives. And yet, after having explored 
and analyzed our own and other worlds, we 
come back utterly ignorant, for the most part, 
of the very house we live in — the house of the 
soul — the fearfully and wonderfully organized 
body. Nor do we know much, if indeed any 
thing, more of its relations to the mind — the 
spiritual inhabitant — that occupies it. 

Or, to use the still more expressive language 
of another writer, " Why is not the science of 
physiology taught in all our colleges ? Astro- 
nomy, natural philosophy, chemistry, mineral- 
ogy, geology, and botany, are not neglected. 
Students are required to become familiar with 
the air they breathe, the water they drink, the 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 37 

fire that warms them, and the dust they tread 
on. They must know something, forsooth, 
about " spots on the sun," eclipses, " northern 
lights," meteoric stones, the " milky way," the 
great bear, the little bear, comets' tails, Saturn's 
rings, and Jupiter's moons. They must know 
all about the variations of the needle, the tides, 
the trade winds, the Gulf Stream, the pheno- 
mena of earthquakes, thunder, volcanic erup- 
tions, why a stone falls down rather than up, 
and what flattened the poles. 

" All this is very well. But what do our 
graduates generally know of the structure of 
their bodies, the functions of the different or- 
gans, and their laws of relation ? Just about 
as much as the Peripatetics did of ideas, when 
they supposed them little filmy things that 
floated oil' from objects, and somehow wormed 
their way through the senses, and finally stuck 
fast on the pineal gland of the brain, like bar- 
nacles. 

"Modern education conducts the student 
round the universe ; bids him scale the heights 
of nature, and drop his fathom line among the 
deep soundings of her abyss, compassing the 



38 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

vast, and analyzing the minute, and yet never 
conducts him over the boundary of that world 
of living wonders which constitutes him man, 
and is at once the abode of his mind, the instru- 
ment of its action, and the subject of its sway. 
Why, I ask, shall every thing else be studied, 
while the human frame is passed over as a 
noteless, forgotten thing? — that masterpiece of 
divine mechanism, pronounced by its Author 
"wonderfully made" and "curiously wrought," 
a temple fitted up by God, and gloriously gar- 
nished for the residence of an immortal in- 
habitant, bearing his own image, and a candi- 
date for "a building of God, eternal in the 
heavens." 

Thousands of students are now prosecuting 
a course of study in our higher seminaries, 
which occupies from six to nine years. Why 
are not a few months set apart for studying 
the architecture of this "earthly house of our 
tabernacle," its simplicity, its beauty, its har- 
mony, its grandeur, its majestic perfection ? 

Is there not something which is peculiarly 
unaccountable — passing strange — in the state 
of things here alluded to ? And is it not still 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 39 

more strange, if possible, that it should be suf- 
fered to remain; that mankind, professing to 
be guided by reason, are so very unreasonable 
as to study and explore and form an intimate 
acquaintance with every thing around them, 
rather than with themselves ? That they 
should be willing to spend thirty, fifty, or 
seventy years in this way, and even go down 
to the grave almost without the slightest know- 
ledge of the framework of their own bodies? 
Grant that matters are in this respect improv- 
ing, they are by no means as they should be. 

Young man, by these remarks, I beseech 
thee to be admonished. Invert not, thus, the 
whole order of things, as the Creator estab- 
lished, or at least designed them. Know thy- 
self. Know every thing if thou canst — every 
thing, I mean, which is worth knowing. But 
remember one thing, in passing. Remember 
that though science and art are long, life at 
best is short; that whatever is worth doing 
should be done with all thy might. That it 
must, moreover, if done at all, be done quickly ; 
since there is neither knowledge nor device in 
the grave, whither thou art fast hastening. Re- 



40 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

member thou art fearfully made up of body, 
mind and spirit ; that thy first duty is to be- 
come acquainted, as much as thou mayest, 
with these — their structure, offices, laws, and 
relations ; and with the relation of them, when 
combined, to thy fellow beings, and thy Eter- 
nal Father. Remember, therefore, I again 
say, whatever else thou knowest, less or more, 
know thou thyself. 

Shall I proffer thee aids in this work ? God 
hath provided them to thy hand already. 
David, the shepherd king of Israel, appears to 
have studied the heavens as well as the earth, 
while watching his father's numerous flocks 
on the plains of Judea. Furnished with light 
which David never had, thou knowest enough 
of thyself, already, to begin the great work. 
Half the wonders of thy frame — the house 
thou occupiest — lie open to the most careless 
observer, who observes at all ; and what is not 
obvious to thine own ingenuity, the labors of 
others will readily supply. Works on Ana- 
tomy, Physiology, and Hygiene, in various 
shapes, suited to thy capacity, are within thy 
reach. Then there are Watts on the Mind, 



SELF-KNOWLEDGE. 



41 



Mason on Self-Knowledge, the works of Dick, 
the Combes, and a host of others ; and last, 
but not least, the Bible. 

Here, after all, is the great volume on Self- 
Knowledge— so plain, that he who runs may 
read— so ample, that it touches every case, of 
every individual, of all ages and climes— so 
satisfactory, that he who acts in its spirit will 
never fail to know himself, to reverence him- 
self, and to transmit himself to coming ages. 

Young men place the golden age in the 
future, and well they may. The study of our- 
selves, in the fullest, largest sense, will enable 
us to enjoy, at least in prospect, all that poets 
have dreamed of in the future, and all that 
philosophy, even Bible Philosophy, has painted 
on the portals of heaven. Know then thyself. 

Ignorant of thyself, thou knowest nothing as 
thou oughtest to know. Know thyself, and 
thou knowest all else which is necessary. 
Know thyself, and obey thyself; know thy 
relations and duties to all within, around, and 
above thee, and nothing can harm thee either 
in this world or in the world which is to come. 



LETTER IV. 

SELF-DEPENDENCE. 

There is a wide difference, my young friends, 
between Self-Dependence and S elf-Confidence. 
A good measure, it is true, even of this last, 
should be in the possession of every young 
person, in order to success in life. I have 
spoken of this before ; but you will allow me 
to advert to it once more. 

I have known a young man, eighteen or 
twenty years of age, who was as destitute of 
confidence in himself as the veriest child. 
Though he was by no means wanting in the 
power to accomplish what he undertook, yet 
such had been his training, that he shrunk from 
every thing which was new to him, or which 
presented but the slightest difficulties. 



SELF-DEPENDENCE. 43 

This unhappy state of things, as I have al- 
ready said, was the result of wrong training. 
The father was in the habit of taking it for 
granted that his son was somewhat wanting 
in the capacity to accomplish any thing, and 
the son knew it. And, as usually happens in 
such cases, what he took the son to be, he in- 
sensibly became. Or if he did not deteriorate, 
there was a tendency to deterioration. 

Another young man, in the same neighbor- 
hood, had been treated in a manner entirely 
different. He had, in early life, lost both his 
parents, and having a character, by constitu- 
tion, somewhat versatile, the circumstances 
and changes to which he had been subjected 
had made him a perfect Alcibiades. He could 
be or do, as he thought, almost any thing he 
pleased. And this confidence in himself was 
so great, as in some instances to secure the 
point, and enable him to execute what never 
could have been accomplished otherwise. 

One day, in the time of sheep-shearing, he 
was passing a yard where an experienced in- 
dividual was engaged in shearing sheep. A 
person who stood looking on, and who knew 



44 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

the drift of the young man, called out, " Henry, 
can you shear sheep ?" " Oh yes," was the 
reply. " Did you ever shear any ?" " Often," 
said he. "Come, then," said the man with 
the shears, " and make the attempt." 

Henry did not hesitate. He was, however, 
only about sixteen years of age ; had just come 
from the city ; and, it was quite probable, had 
never seen a sheep sheared, before, in his life. 
For it is almost unnecessary to say that situat- 
ed as he had been, he had learned one thing — 
the art of telling a falsehood very smoothly. 

To the surprise, however, of all, he succeed- 
ed very well. And his success was owing, in 
part at least, to his self-confidence. The 
young man of twenty, of whom I have already 
spoken, stood by, and was as much surprised 
as any of the company ; for though brought up 
in a land of flocks and herds, he would have 
no more thought of shearing a sheep, than of 
going, even at that time, to California. 

Self-confidence in excess, however, is as in- 
jurious as its opposite — extreme distrust or 
diffidence. Self-dependence, on the other hand, 
can hardly be in excess, in any possible in- 



SELF-DEPENDENCE. 45 

stance. The more of it, the better. Thou- 
sands, at least, suffer for want of a due propor- 
tion of this rare quality, to one for too much 
of it. McClure, the geologist, insists that it is 
on this account, in part, that orphans make 
their way best in the world. But orphans do 
not make their way best. 

Some, indeed, viewing the matter religious- 
ly, might imagine evil as the result of large 
self-dependence. But I am not speaking here 
of the dependence we should have on our- 
selves, as opposed to the dependence we should 
have on our parents, or on others ; much less 
on God. I suppose, however, that the more 
truly self-dependent we are, in a religious 
sense, the more truly shall we depend on a 
heavenly Father; and, on the contrary, the 
less we depend on ourselves, the less shall we 
depend on God. For he only has these oppo- 
sites in just measure, who is in harmony with 
himself and with all other things ; and the 
truly religious man is, after all, the only man 
of true harmony, 

If we could contrive some way to throw the 
young upon their own resources, or, in other 



46 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

words, render them self-dependent, and at the 
same time make them feel their own littleness 
and dependence, a most important point would 
be gained to the cause of education, and the 
happiness of each rising generation greatly 
augmented. But to unite these two, if indeed 
they can be united, seems to be reserved for 
remote generations. 

I love to see a young man modest, and 
even diffident ; and yet I love to see him self- 
confident to a considerable extent, and self- 
dependent, very largely. Without self-con- 
fidence and self-dependence, he will hardly 
make much progress in the world — with them, 
he will hardly fail to go forward, in some 
direction or another. 

He will be, in fact, much like a ship at 
sea, with a fair wind. If she has a good pilot, 
she will probably reach the desired haven ; if 
otherwise, there can be no certainty on this 
subject. So with a young man. If his head 
be a wise helmsman, he will come out safe ; but 
if not, he may suffer a most dangerous, if not 
fatal shipwreck. 

In any event — I repeat the remark — I love to 



SELF-DEPENDENCE. 47 

find a young man really and truly self-de- 
pendent. I love to have him feel as if he 
could be and do any thing that was ever done 
by man. I do not mean by this, that he should 
feel as if he could do all things equally well ? 
or even as well as some others ; but I do de- 
sire to see every young man " going ahead." 

The rich young man is not likely to be self- 
dependent. Things have been done for him 
too much. He has never felt want. Of 
course he has never enjoyed the pleasure of 
providing, by his own efforts of body or mind, 
for his own necessities. Whether a student, a 
laborer, a merchant, a mechanic or a manu- 
facturer, he will hardly succeed in accomplish- 
ing much, because he has never been taught 
the very first lesson. 

This is one of the great evils of riches — not 
that it spoils the possessor himself, though this 
were bad enough, but that it spoils his chil- 
dren. Or if there be exceptions to the truth 
of this remark, they are few and far between. 

The indigent man is not much better off, 
however. His poverty is apt to create in him 
meanness of spirit. Hence the wisdom of 



48 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Agur's prayer of old — " Give me neither pov- 
erty nor riches." If Agur, at his time of life, 
was likely to be tempted to mean or dishonest 
acts by poverty, it is not likely the young can 
escape. But this meanness to which I allude 
— the exact opposite of what was alluded to in 
a former paragraph — is entirely unfavorable to 
true self-dependence. 

I do not mean to say, or to intimate, that 
the quality to which I refer is never found in 
either a rich or poor young man ; but only 
that both riches and poverty present or bring 
with them their difficulties. That they are 
occasionally surmounted by genius, and even 
by other circumstances, is most cheerfully 
admitted. 

The remarks which have been made in 
regard to the two extremes of poverty and 
riches, in their effects on the self-dependence 
of young men, may be applied to many other 
circumstances and conditions of human life. 
Perhaps we may profitably spend a few mo- 
ments on this topic. 

Rank is unfavorable to self-dependence. 
Thus he who, by birth, is made lord, or duke, 



SELF-DEPENDENCE. 49 

or even esquire, is thereby absolved — I mean 
practically — from the duty of self exertion. 
He is not likely to rise to the condition of 
monarch on the one hand, do what he may, 
nor is he much more likely to sink to the con- 
dition of serf or peasant on the other. 

And then the latter — the individual who in 
a country of lords and tenants, is born at the 
lower extreme of society — what can he do? 
For it is not possible, in one case in a million, 
that he should rise above his rank. And stu- 
pid as he is, he generally knows it, and governs 
himself accordingly. 

I have seen the slave in the service of his 
master. What motive had he to self-depend- 
ence ? He must depend on his master. For 
let him make ever so much exertion, become 
ever so active or enterprising, and he is still 
but a slave, and as a general rule must ex- 
pect to remain so. 

What a blessed thing it is to be born in a 
country, where riches and poverty, and rank 
and caste have not produced their worst effects 
— and where slavery even is not as yet univer- 

3 



50 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

sal ! What a favor to be born in the United 
States of America ! That things are not as 
they should be, even here, is most readily and 
fully conceded. That the spirit of wealth, 
rank and caste are abroad, and on the increase 
among us, is most certain. That the circum- 
stances into which the young man is intro- 
duced at birth, are, in many respects, greatly 
unfavorable to self-dependence, cannot be de- 
nied. Still it would be difficult for the young 
to improve their condition in this particular, by 
going to another country. For whither shall 
they go? Here, the road is open to riches, 
honors, preferment. Every young man may 
be an Astor, a Polk, a Franklin or a Dwight— 
just as he pleases ; provided he will make 
such exertion as God and nature and circum- 
stances have placed within his reach and 
power. 

Need I repeat the exhortation to the young 
to avail themselves of the circumstances and 
privileges thus allotted them? Need I urge 
them to remember that they are born, not in 
the twelfth or the sixteenth century, nor in 



SELF-DEPENDENCE. 51 

South Africa or in New Zealand, nor even 
in Oregon or California, but in the nineteenth 
century, and in the United States of Amer- 
ica? 



LETTER V. 

SELF-EDUCATION. 

In a preceding letter, I have more than inti- 
mated that the great business of young men is 
the formation of right character for noble ends ; 
in other words, self-education. For what is 
this world ; what is human life, at least in its 
earliest stages, but a great school of education? 
Nay, I might even ask, were this the appropri- 
ate place for it, What is Christianity itself but 
a system — a set of lessons, so to speak — pre- 
pared by Heaven for the purpose of making 
men — and the young, of course — wiser and 
better ? 

My purpose, at the present time, will be to 
say something about the means and processes 
of this self-education — this formation of char- 



SELF-EDUCATION. 53 

acter — more especially beyond the precincts of 
the family circle, and the domain of family 
influences. And in the first place, allow me to 
speak of what I choose to call harmony. 

By harmony in the formation of character, 
I mean such a development of the individual 
as will produce uniformity. Every young 
man understands the term in its application to 
a musical performance, as well as to architec- 
ture. Yet as surely as a piece of music should 
be harmonious, or the various parts of an 
edifice or temple in due proportion and har- 
mony, so should the human character— the 
Christian temple. In truth, a want of har- 
mony in the latter case is as much more to be 
deplored, as the imperishable is more valuable 
than the perishable. 

Man's nature, as I have before said, is not 
simple and uncompounded. It is in the image 
of its Divine author. Man is made up of 
body, soul, and spirit, as Paul has it ; or of 
body, head, and heart, as the moderns. In 
either case the idea is the same ; man is at 
once a physical, intellectual, and moral being. 

Now, in order to produce a harmonious de- 



54 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

velopment of human character, as well as har- 
monious results, all these departments, so to 
call them, of human nature, must be properly- 
developed and cultivated. If this is done, and 
done early, the result is what might be called 
— what is called in fact— a proper balance. 
Thus a harmonious character is a well-bal- 
anced character. 

But where shall we go, it may be asked, to 
find such a character — an individual, young 
or old, in whom body, head and heart, are 
proportionally developed and cultivated ? Men 
in all ages and climes, and under every dis- 
pensation, have been but mere fragments of 
men. To point to one harmonious character 
—perfectly so — would be to point to something 
beyond the precincts of either sacred or pro- 
fane history. 

Acknowledged. " No mere man" — none but 
the God-man — has been found to come up 
to this beau-ideal of perfect humanity. But 
what then ? Because man has never come up 
to the dignity of his nature, does it follow that 
he never will do it ? 

That we know not yet what we shall or 



SELF-EDUCATION. 55 

can be, is alike the language of religion and 
philosophy. Suppose, however, it were not 
so ; suppose, as I believe to be .true, that men 
have hitherto been mere fragments of men, is 
it not equally true — is it not even certain — 
that the larger fragments, or rather those 
which embraced the greatest number of ele- 
ments belonging to the common mass, have 
been most useful ? 

If it should be argued that young men, such 
as I am addressing, are not expected to have" 
those well-balanced natures which farther 
education and a more extended experience 
would be apt to develope — that indeed they 
cannot have them — I should meet the argu- 
ment by a flat and positive denial. Your 
character should be as harmonious at four as 
at sixteen, and at sixteen as at sixty. It 
should be in harmony at every age of moral 
accountability, and in all circumstances. And 
if the rabbins and teachers of this or any other 
age or clime have taught otherwise, this does 
not alter the matter of fact. " To the law and 
to the testimony." 

One reason why men have been hitherto 



56 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

so little harmonious in their character, may 
be, that society, as a whole, has been inhar- 
monious. Society — civilized society I here 
mean more particularly — like the individuals 
of which it is made up, is unequally and 
inharmoniously developed in the very best cir- 
cumstances. 

Sometimes the intellectual part is greatly 
in advance of the moral ; perhaps even of the 
physical. In other instances it may be the 
moral predominates, or at least leads. More 
commonly, however, the physical part of the 
social system is greatly in advance of all the 
rest. Such is the fact — most strikingly so — at 
the present moment. Nor is this the worst. 
The wonderful progress of labor-saving ma- 
chinery and the arts is greatly increasing this 
preponderance. 

Now the greater this want of harmony in 
human society, considered as one huge indi- 
vidual, the greater the tendency to a want of 
harmony in the individuals of which it is 
composed. Some have even said that this 
tendency is inevitable. I do not so regard it, 
however. Man is not a mere machine. To 



SELF-EDUCATION. 57 

his machinery is superadded free agency ; and 
this enables him not only to control matter, 
and hold in abeyance some of the laws and 
tendencies of matter, but even to turn them to 
a good account. 

This view of the case, young men, indicates 
your true position in civil society. You inherit 
an inharmonious tendency to begin with. 
Then, as you pass on through infancy and 
childhood to youth and adolescence, your edu- 
cation but serves to confirm what has been so 
inauspiciously begun. Your appetites are mis- 
directed, your physical powers in general per- 
verted or misemployed, and your pampered 
bodies either stinted on the one hand, in a 
greater or less degree, or on the other hand 
pushed to giant size or diseased fulness. 

Meanwhile, by neglect, your mind and heart 
suffer ; or, if otherwise, their growth is sickly. 
For the law of organized bodies, as yet but 
faintly alluded to, that if one member suffers 
all the members suffer with it, is as applicable 
to the three departments of man's nature of 
which I have already spoken, as to those sub- 



58 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

divisions of each to which I shall hereafter call 
your attention. 

Is any individual discouraged by the views 
I have suggested ? I trust otherwise. What 
is wanted in self-education is a correct under- 
standing of our true position and relations — 
what we are and what we can be. For that 
Divine Providence who bids us follow the path 
of the just, which shineth brighter and brighter 
to the perfect day, would never place one more 
difficulty in our way than is needed, in order 
to call forth our slumbering or estranged fac- 
ulties and powers, and lead us by a faithful 
co-operation with him, not only to the full de- 
velopment of our whole nature, but to a de- 
velopment and cultivation of that nature which 
shall render all things healthy and harmoni- 
ous. 

Instead, therefore, of being discouraged, the 
view which I have presented is, above all 
others, that which seems to me best calculated 
to give motive to new exertion and increased 
activity. The fact that so many difficulties 
lie in our way, should only serve to urge us 



SELF-EDUCATION. 59 

onward in the path which leads to certain vic- 
tory. God made man for himself ; but in order 
to this end he requires that our complicated 
nature, like his own, should be harmonious. 
For it is only when man is in peace and har- 
mony with himself that he can be in harmony 
with his Creator. 

And yet once more. The greater the vic- 
tory to be achieved, the greater the reward. 
Even the "joy set before" the young man of 
Nazareth was proportioned to the difficulties 
which he volunteered to surmount. The more 
inharmonious your constitutions, taking them 
as they are in these confines of creation, the 
higher may you rise, when by faith, and peni- 
tence, and patience, and perseverance, you 
shall have overcome. You are called to 
achieve victories — one victory at least, the vic- 
tory over yourself — to which, in all probability, 
no angel, cherub, or seraph was ever called. 
Nor is it certain that your upward flight, as I 
have before said, shall not, in remote periods of 
eternity, as greatly transcend theirs, as the re- 
joicings of high heaven over the repenting sin- 



60 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

ner exceed its rejoicings over the ninety and 
nine just persons that need no repentance. 

To return from this digression — but not at 
present, as I have written at too great length 
already. Let me only add, that in future let- 
ters, I will endeavor to avoid the preaching 
style into which, in this communication, I have 
inadvertently fallen, and pursue a style of in- 
struction — so far as I am capable of instructing 
— like that which is said to have so much in- 
terested the numerous and patient readers of 
my early work, the " Young Man's Guide "— 
a work, to which this is intended as a sequel. 



LETTER VL 

HARMONY OF CHARACTER. 

It has been shown you, in a former letter, that 
in order to perfection of character, your whole 
nature, physical, intellectual and moral, must 
not only be largely developed and cultivated 
to a high pitch, but must be developed and 
cultivated in due proportion and harmony. I 
wish, now, to lead your minds a little farther 
in the same general direction. 

Each of the three great divisions or depart- 
ments of human nature has also its subdivi- 
sions. Thus, what we call the mind, or the 
intellectual domain, is made up, as you well 
know, of many different faculties. So the 
heart, or moral domain, is regarded as includ- 
ing all the various affections and passions. 



62 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

So, also, the physical department includes 
brain, nerves, lungs, skin, heart, stomach, &c. 
&c. 

Now it is absolutely necessary, in order to 
the full and perfect and harmonious develop- 
ment and cultivation of your whole nature, 
that all these subdivisions of each grand de- 
partment of humanity should receive its 
due share of attention. It is, moreover, a 
physiological truth of high antiquity — that if 
one member suffers, all the members suffer with 
it, and that if one member rejoices, all the 
members rejoice with it ! The same law may 
be applied to the various under-departments 
of our intellectual and moral nature, no less 
than to the physical. Whether Paul intend- 
ed any other application, is, of course, uncer- 
tain.* 

Permit me, however, to confine your atten- 
tion for a few moments to the physical depart- 



* If the suggestions of Adam Clark, in his Commentary, 
have weight, there is reason for believing that Paul received a 
medical education, either at Alexandria or elsewhere. This, 
alone, would account for his figures of speech. 



HARMONY OF CHARACTER. 63 

ment of your nature ; and for the sake of illus- 
tration to introduce a new figure. 

Let us compare the body to a confederacy 
of smaller States, like the Federal Union in 
which our lot is cast. Let Massachusetts, if 
you please, represent the cerebral system ; New 
York, the respiratory or breathing system ; 
Pennsylvania the stomach, and so on ; each 
State representing some important, though by 
no means equally large and important, organ 
or system of organs. 

Now, can any thing be more obvious than 
that if the smallest member of this great con- 
federacy suffers — even little Rhode Island — all 
the other members suffer with it ? Or that if 
one of these members rejoices — has its condi- 
tion improved — all the others rejoice with it ? 

And yet it is equally true of the members 
of the human confederacy of which I have 
spoken, that they sympathize strongly with 
each other, and if one rejoices or suffers all the 
others rejoice or suffer with it. A finger, even, 
cannot suffer without involving the rest of the 
system in suffering in some small degree. 

One form, in which the suffering to which 1 



64 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

refer is manifested, consists in a want of proper 
harmony in the system. Thus, if the skin 
suffers for a considerable time, whether from 
over-activity or any thing else, the lungs, or 
some other part which sympathizes strongly 
with it, is soon thrown off its balance, so to 
speak, either by being overworked or other- 
wise. 

This, again, produces disturbance in the 
nervous and digestive systems, and finally a 
clashing of interests, and perhaps downright 
opposition. And now a civil war ensues, or 
may ensue, in which too often the whole con- 
federacy is destroyed. In other instances, how- 
ever, this inharmonious condition of things 
constitutes chronic disease of greater or less 
severity. 

Finally, the organs of the body having De- 
come involved in war, the evils are extended 
to the soul and spirit, as Paul calls them ; or, 
in other words, to the intellectual and moral 
departments of our complicated nature. 

This civil war of the human confederacy 
may be set on foot in a thousand ways. I 
have no time or room now for detail — hardly 



HARMONY OF CHARACTER. 65 

for enumeration. Excess or deficiency of their 
appropriate stimuli ; excess of employment, 
which in these days is too much divided and 
subdivided; employment which is not well 
adapted to the constitution and temperament 
of the individual ; unhealthy stimuli applied 
to the different organs ; — these are general 
names for large classes of causes, which break 
up or prevent harmony in the physical, and 
ultimately in the intellectual and moral do- 
main ; and, as an indirect but inevitable result, 
produce a want of proper harmony of char- 
acter.* 

Let me dwell for a moment, in passing, on 
one point. I have spoken of labor as being too 
much divided and subdivided, for health and 
harmony in the physical frame. Do not sup- 
pose I am ignorant of the many advantages 
to be derived from a minute division of labor. 
Yet all these, important as they may be, are 
greatly outweighed by the injury done to cer- 
tain parts of the human system. 

* I am not attempting here to teach physiology. This 
subject and the laws of health I have reserved, chiefly, for 
another letter and a future volume. 



66 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Some of the muscles are overworked ; some 
not worked at all. One organ, or set of organs, 
for example, is cramped, or its motion impeded ; 
another, having full play, not only does its 
own work, but attempts to aid its cramped or 
enfeebled neighbor. Mind, too, in its varied 
faculties, suffers in a similar way ; but this 
belongs to another department of my subject — 
to which, by the way, we must now hasten. 

In order to insure entire harmony of charac- 
ter, no one of the intellectual faculties should 
be overtasked or strained on the one hand, or 
neglected or dwarfed on the other. Yet 
whether or not you may be conscious of it, 
this error is committed all the way from the 
cradle to the grave. The memory is cultiva- 
ted, it may be, or rather an attempt is made to 
cultivate it ; while perception, attention, com- 
parison and judgment being overlooked or ne- 
glected, become enfeebled ; and the result is a 
loss of balance— a want of due harmony — in 
the mental character. But I have said this 
before. 

Again, in the selection of your studies, the 
same unwise course is often pursued. Certain 



HARMONY OF CHARACTER. 67 

studies — say the mathematical ones — receive 
a large share of your attention, while the 
others, or some of the others, are neglected. I 
am greatly pained when I find, as I often do, 
this great practical error in some of our best 
schools. On this very point — neglecting the 
natural sciences and the study of men and 
things, and substituting in their place, algebra 
and the languages — harmony of character is 
daily and hourly destroyed. And the great 
misfortune of all, concerning it, is, that even 
our Normal Schools, High Schools, and Col- 
leges, in some instances, are perpetuating the 
evil. 

Conversation, at home and abroad, has very 
generally the same inharmonious tendency ; 
and so have books. One whole class of school 
books, in particular, is so constructed — and this 
without the slightest necessity — as to turn the 
thoughts, for the most part to money-getting. 
Public addresses often have the same or worse 
results. Can the tendency of such things be 
mistaken, in a country and period like our 
own ? And could any thing be to the young 
more unfortunate ? 



68 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

But I must not dwell too long on this part 
of my subject, on account of the pain you will 
feel at the presentation of so dark a picture. 
I am even not without fears I shall discourage 
you. Here we are, you will say, such as we 
are, sufferers in many particulars, both by in- 
heritance and education ; and we cannot go 
back. This I understand, very well. I have 
been a young man, as well as you. I have 
felt the difficulties under which you labor — 
difficulties, however, which are daily and 
hourly increasing. 

And yet — I repeat the sentiment — in order 
to get right and be right, you must understand 
your true position and condition. As well 
might the wise surgeon dispense with examin- 
ing — probing, even to the quick — the wounds 
and ulcers which fall under his observation 
and care, as the moral physician neglect to be- 
gin the work of reformation, in the young, at 
the foundations of character. 

Instead of having gone too far, therefore, I 
have not yet gone far enough. I have scarcely 
adverted to the moral causes of a w r ant of that 
harmony in the human character of which I 



HARMONY OF CHARACTER. 69 

speak. These must not, my young friends, be 
overlooked ; though they may perhaps be de- 
ferred for the present. 

More than once I have expressed a fear of 
discouraging you by the magnitude of the 
work which is assigned you. Yet the beloved 
apostle calls young men strong, and says he 
writes to them because they are so. And so 
do I. Of old men — of men above forty, even 
— I have little hope. But I have great faith 
in the ability of young men, could that ability 
be rightly directed. 

They are not, I know, quite omnipotent. 
They cannot wield mountains of difficulty 
with the facility of power which Milton as- 
cribes to the warring angels in his Paradise 
Lost. And yet they can remove them grad- 
ually. And what they can do, as I have 
already said, they are bound to do. 

Nay, there is a sense in which young men, 
no less than old ones, are bound to do more 
than they can. Their great work (and greater 
work could not well be assigned them) is vic- 
tory over themselves— these miseducated, mis- 
directed, inharmonious selves, of which I have 



70 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

been speaking. Yet for this victory even, they 
are abundantly qualified, because if they go 
forth to the battle, in the right spirit, the God 
of Hosts will be with them ; and what power 
they cannot command of themselves, as young 
men merely, his abundant favor will supply. 



LETTER VII. 

SELF- INSTRUCTION. 

It will require a long time to free the minds 
of young men from the erroneous impression 
that their education is completed in the schools ; 
whereas the instruction of these institutions, 
important as it is, should merely present us 
with the keys of knowledge. To obtain these, 
is a comparatively trifling work ; to unlock the 
golden treasures to which they give us access, 
is the work of a life. Education, in its largest 
sense, as we have already seen, is a life work. 
Even that part of education which we call 
instruction, only begins in the schools ; at 
least, it should be so. With too many, it both 
begins and ends there. 

I have sometimes wondered why it is, that 



72 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

in a country which has produced a Franklin, 
and where so many young men have superior 
advantages to those which that philosopher, 
while young, enjoyed, we have so few Frank- 
lins. Is it not because so few continue, as he 
did, to old age, the work of self-instruction ? 

The road to eminence which Franklin trod, 
is as surely open as the road to wealth, or poli- 
tical distinction. As well may the young man 
take Franklin for his model as John Jacob 
Astor, or Stephen Girard ; nay, even as Wash- 
ington or Napoleon. 

The desire for improvement in our American 
young men, is most certainly feeble — I mean 
as a general rule. I do not forget, now, the 
tendency of old men to place the golden age in 
the past. We have facts. Meursius, an an- 
cient writer, has shown that there were, in his 
time, " more than three hundred public places 
in Athens" alone, to which "the principal 
youth and reputable citizens were accustomed 
to resort for the purpose of conversation and 
inquiry." And we have the testimony of Luke, 
the companion of Paul, that the Athenians 
were a thinking people — spending much of 



SELF-INSTRUCTION. 73 

their time in the pursuit of knowledge of some 
sort 

Shall the young men of the United States 
of America, in 1849, be behind the young men 
of heathen Athens of 54 ? And yet have we 
not great reason to fear they are so ? One 
tenth the number of institutions for mutual 
improvement, in the same population, would, 
in these days, be a novel sight. 

Of course, I do not mean to say that there 
are no exceptions to the truth of these remarks, 
for there are many — some of them honorable 
ones. Even in those parts of the country 
where no school instruction has hitherto been 
enjoyed, the yoimg man has occasionally 
" started out of the ranks," and made himself 
eminent, at least among his fellows. 

I knew a man, not long since — then about 
fourscore — who, without the opportunity of 
attending school for a single day during his 
whole life, had become quite distinguished in 
his own neighborhood. And how was this 
distinction attained ? Was it without effort — 
patient, persevering effort? Never. 

This man, in early life, having been taught 

4 



74 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

by his mother to read a little, laid by money, 
and purchased a dictionary. It was by no 
means a large or costly work ; but then it was 
precious to him. Whenever, in reading or 
conversation, he encountered a hard word, he 
examined his dictionary, found the meaning, 
and retained it. 

This laid the foundation of a good mind ; 
and indeed of a large fund of what the phi- 
losopher Locke used to call large, sound, 
roundabout common sense. Now what this 
plain, obscure individual could do, others, in 
circumstances a thousand times more favor 
able, most certainly can. 

I have in my mind's eye, at this moment, 
another young man, who without either dic- 
tionary or school, for the first years of his life, 
availed himself of every advantage, which the 
family in which he resided afforded him, and 
became, at length, quite a respectable scholar. 
He was at eighteen a schoolmaster; and at 
twenty-five, at the summit of this profession. 

Is it for want of time that more is not done ? 
Who has not as much time as Franklin had ? 
Who has not as much of this precious com- 



SELF-INSTRUCTION. 75 

modity, to say the least, as the man of whom 
I have been speaking ? Is it for want of mo- 
ney ? Who has not money enough to buy a 
dictionary? Every young man has shreds, 
both of time and money, which might be saved 
for this purpose.* 

Young men, however, are very far from 
being driven to as close quarters as all this 
would imply. They can have more than a 
dictionary. Most of them have newspapers ; 
bad, good, or indifferent. And much may be 
learned from any of these— even the worst. 
Man's mental stomach, like his physical, is 
made susceptible of receiving and procuring 
nourishment from almost every kind of food. 

Then, again, few families can be found, in 
wliich a young man could be thrown, who 



* I can hardly forbear, in this place, to commend to young 
men, the beautiful edition of Noah Webster's Dictionary, 
unabridged, lately published. It is one of the noblest produc- 
tions of our language ; and is of itself a library. What would 
the dictionary man above mentioned have thought of such a 
treasure ? What would Franklin ? Two cents a day— and 
this many young men might save in cigars or coffee — in one 
year, would more than procure it. 



76 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

have not more or fewer books ; some of them 
valuable ones. Besides this, there are circu- 
lating, parish and school libraries. And lastly, 
there are lyceums, clubs, debating societies, 
&c, of whose advantages most young men 
may avail themselves, or, if there are not 
enough of these, more may be established. 

One or two errors in reading, and indeed in 
self-instruction generally, remain to be noticed, 
Not a few young men fall into the error of 
reading too much. This is especially the case 
with those who use no dictionary. They who 
make it a point to understand every thing they 
read, and who constantly ask the meaning of 
new words, terms and phrases which obstruct 
their course, will not be likely to fall into the 
wretched habit which is often alluded to by 
saying that it passes into one ear and out at 
the other. They will do something more than 
merely devour books — swallow them whole — 
they will "read, mark, learn, and inwardly 
digest." 

Another error consists in sitting up to read 
late at night. I speak not here of the physical 
dangers, great as they are ; but rather of the 



SELF-INSTRUCTION. 77 

mental and moral dangers of this practice. It 
is greatly unfavorable to the growth of mind 
— to its healthy growth especially. But I 
think it still more unfavorable to moral growth 
and progress. 

Do you ask why it is so ? There are many 
and various reasons. One is, that what is read 
at a late hour, when we are over-fatigued in 
body and mind, being usually of an exciting 
character, only tends to fill the brain with 
unnatural images, during both our waking and 
sleeping hours. Fancy and imagination are 
apt to predominate, at this hour of the day, 
and sober judgment seldom gains the ascend- 
ency. If exciting books are read at all, they 
should be read in the forenoon, and not in the 
evening. Should it be said that other books 
might be read at these late hours, as well as 
the class I have described, my reply is, they 
will not be, as a general fact. The appetite at 
this hour as seldom craves such food for the 
mind as for the body. 



LETTER VIII. 

LIGHT READING. 

So numerous are the influences which have 
an unfavorable tendency on young men, by 
forming inharmonious and therefore unhappy 
character, that one hardly knows at what 
point to commence his remarks. I propose, 
however, to bring before your minds, at the 
present time, the subject of light reading, 
the topic with which I closed my last letter. 

But I must define my terms ; for one-half 
the mental confusion — not to say mischief of 
this world — has its origin in vague or unde- 
fined words and terms. By light reading, then, 
I mean such books, papers and periodicals as 
amuse and enable you to "kill time/' or at 
least " while " it away ; but leave little or no 



LIGHT READING. 79 

lasting impression on the mind and heart. — 
Among these, stand conspicuous many of our 
more popular periodicals. 

In a former letter, I alluded to the evils of a 
minute division of labor. One would think 
that such division would save time for other 
purposes, such as reading and study — and this, 
I confess, is its natural tendency. Yet such is 
the operation of various circumstances and in- 
fluences, that people seem not only to have 
less time for other purposes than formerly, but 
also less disposition to make a wise and profit- 
able use of their leisure hours, whenever they 
arrive. 

The mania for light reading, which has 
been more or less prevalent ever since the 
adventures of Paul on Mars Hill, has of late 
been increasing. We not only confine our 
selves more than formerly to light reading, but 
we read still more " by snatches !" 

For this ever-increasing but ever-unfavorable 
habit, the present age furnishes almost un- 
bounded facilities. There never was a time 
when so many books and newspapers were 
circulated as at the present day. 



80 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Then, again, they are exceedingly cheap. 
Few families can be found who do not take 
one or more newspapers or magazines ; and 
not a few take three or four, including at least 
one daily. Some, indeed, there are who take 
from five to ten or twelve continually. One 
family I visited lately— that of a mechanic — 
takes fourteen. Another family I know takes 
about a dozen. 

I will not stop here to'caution you against 
receiving this or that paper, or journal, or mag- 
azine ; or to commend to your favorable regard 
the other. To this and other particulars, 1 
may or may not descend by and by. What I 
propose, at this time, is to dissuade you, if pos- 
sible, from your present course ; and suggest 
one which is not only more favorable to a 
healthful and harmonious growth of character, 
but actually more pleasurable in the passing 
moment 

The more you read mere fragments, the 
more you are inclined to do so ; and the more 
you will disrelish any and every other mode. 
And the more you spend your shreds of time 
in this way, on the plea that they are mere 



LIGHT READING. §1 

shreds, the shorter they seem to become. 
This, at least, is the result of my own obser- 
vation—nor has my opportunity or range for 
observation been very limited. 

This will probably explain the well-known 
fact that light reading, and reading little more 
than mere shreds— such as abound in the 
papers, especially the dailies— is perpetually 
increasing, so that no one can tell where it is 
likely to end. 

I am no enemy, by the way, to light read- 
ing. Books, magazines, and newspapers of 
this sort, all have their place. A small share 
of our time, however valuable this precious 
gift of God may be— and no one, I am sure, 
can estimate it too highly— may be very pro- 
perly expended on some kinds of light reading. 
But so long as human nature remains as it 
now is— perhaps as long as it exists— the ten- 
dency to excess will need to be watched and 
guarded against. Few, if any, read light 
works too little. 

Some six or seven months ago, I was stop- 
ping for a short time in one of the flourishing 
Tillages of New England, when two individ- 



4* 



82 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

uals came • through the street selling books. 
One had such works as The Young Man's 
Guide, The Young Mother, Young Wife, &c. 
The other had books of a very different char- 
acter—and among the rest, the catchpennies 
of the day, such as the cheaper lives of Scott, 
Taylor, the works of Eugene Sue, &c. The 
latter sold readily— the former hardly at all 

Now I will not take it upon me to commend 
the former or condemn the latter, by whole- 
sale ; but I am justified in condemning that 
public taste which wholly excludes the plain 
and practical, and seizes and devours indis- 
criminately the noisy, the light, or the vis- 
ionary ; and yet nothing can be more certain 
than that such are the tendencies of things at 
the present time. 

If this state of things is to continue for half 
a century to come— if the young mind, I 
mean, is to go on in its present course, becom- 
ing more and more averse to any thing solid, 
and more and more inclined to light papers, 
and novels, and catchpennies, it is quite diffi- 
cult to predict the final issue of things. Certain 



LIGHT READING. 83 

it is, however, that they can be only evil, and 
that continually. 

Against this depraved taste, and these de- 
praved mental habits, my young friends, let 
me most earnestly entreat you to enter your 
protest. If life were long enough to read every 
thing, not every thing the press pours forth 
would be fit for you to read. And if you can 
justify yourselves in reading one hour a day, 
or so, the lighter works — those in which fancy 
and not fact predominate — how can you allow 
yourselves in devoting your days and nights 
to them ? And if you are willing to glance at 
a daily paper — the common catchpenny dailies, 
I mean, and not the more respectable ones — 
now and then, does it follow that you are 
doing right when you spend an hour or two 
on them of every day you live ? 

What I have said thus far, in this letter, has 
been said on the supposition that these " light 
concerns," were only negatively injurious ; that 
is, that they only injure you, by frittering 
away your time, and feeding a distempered 
taste and brain. 

But I have more to say against them. Not 



84 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

a few are positively injurious — first, by the 
false colorings they hold out, and the false 
views they present of human life ; secondly, 
by the depravity and infidelity which, under 
a mistaken garb, they too often conceal ; 
thirdly, by the downright falsities which some 
of them contain. 

The more you find yourself inclined to read 
by snatches, and to prefer light books and 
periodicals to those which are more solid, the 
more active should be your organ of caution. 
" I tremble for the man who does not tremble 
for himself," said an aged advocate of teeto- 
talism ; and I can adopt his language in rela- 
tion to the subject before you. A young man 
who trembles for himself is the only young 
man who is safe. He may possibly be cau- 
tious how he ventures beyond his ken or depth 
in waters unknown to him ; no one else I am 
sure will be. 

If there were no books, papers or magazines 
among us, which in their character approxi- 
mate to what they should be, the case would 
be greatly altered. But that state of civilized 
society which brings upon us a flood of light 



LIGHT READING. 85 

papers and magazines, and a world of mawk- 
ish and sickly stuff, whose only recommenda- 
tion is that it is new and cheap, brings us at 
the same time many highly valuable publica- 
tions, both new and old, and at a greatly re- 
duced price. He must be poor, indeed, who 
has his health, if he cannot procure a library 
of choice reading, both periodical and perma- 
nent. 

Those of us who complain of the present 
state of things, in the gross, should not fail to 
remember that there never was a time before, 
when so much choice reading could be pro- 
cured for so little money. And we should not 
only remember the fact, but be grateful. 

He who would educate himself in the best 
possible manner, and who would stand before 
the community not only in harmony with his 
Creator, but also with himself, should be more 
careful in the choice of his books and papers 
than in the choice of any thing else in the wide 
world, except friends. Indeed, books and 
papers — materials for reading and thinking — 
are friends. Happy, then, the young man 



86 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

who is so fortunate as to make a wise selec- 
tion ! 

Young men are usually fond of history and 
biography — and they ought to be. They love 
to study men and things. Would they were 
as anxious to know themselves as to become 
acquainted with others ; for then, should they 
catch the spirit of reform, they might, per- 
chance, be as anxious to mend themselves as 
to point out to others the path of amendment, 
or sneer at their imperfections. 

This love of studying men and things, I 
have said, is laudable. It is only a morbid 
desire of this kind that leads the young to 
search the outside pages of newspapers, and 
the inside of magazines and works of fiction, 
for something wherewith to feed what might 
have been fanned into a heavenly flame. It 
is this never-satisfied and never-to-be-satisfied 
desire that furnishes a market for certain papers 
which I could name, by thousands and tens 
of thousands, while not a few of our more 
meritorious ones hardly pay their way. 

I grant, indeed, that the details of real life 
are sometimes more wonderful, as well as more 



LIGHT READING. 87 

inviting, than romance. But this is not usually 
so. The better histories of the better class of 
mankind are not in general spiced high enough 
for those who have not been trained to plain 
food. Oberlin and Howard are read with far 
less interest than Napoleon and Alexander ; 
and Jesus Christ and his apostles with still less 
than either. 

Be exhorted, then, to correct a false taste as 
soon as possible. Accustom yourselves to read 
a portion of biography or history, sacred or 
profane, every day you live. The more you 
read, in this way, just as it is with plain food 
for the body, the more you will find yourselves 
satisfied with plain things, and the less will 
you be disposed to read that to which I have 
been all along objecting ; and above all, of 
that which can never profit you, but must only 
perish in the using. 

Read, too, as you may have opportunity, the 
lives of distinguished reformers. Our Saviour 
was indeed the greatest of them ; and to his 
life and deeds, I have already directed your 
attention. But I have also to direct you to 
the lives of some of his followers. 



88 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

I begin with Paul. Let me be understood 
here. I am not speaking now so much in the 
character of a religious man, as that of an 
educationist. Would you educate yourselves, 
learn much more than you have ever yet 
learned of Paul. 

Then, to come to later times, study Luther. 
For this purpose, perhaps, you will do well 
to procure D'Aubigne's History of the Refor- 
mation. Luther was not faultless ; but you 
may learn much from him about self-edu- 
cation to virtuous and energetic character. 

Howard and Oberlin come next, in my esti- 
mation. You will be most pleased, I think, 
however, with the latter. Perhaps he was not 
so great a man as the former ; but then he was 
quite as practical. 

In later times, still, there are many bright, 
shining examples, among the modern mis- 
sionaries. Here I will not particularize, for 
obvious reasons. But I know not where you 
can go, among the living, for such specimens 
of all that is truly great and noble, as among 
these very men. 

Take, for example, a case cited by Sir Gilbert 



LIGHT READING. 89 

Blane, in his Medical Jurisprudence. Anxious 
to save time, that he might complete the trans- 
lation of an important work, the missionary 
contrived, or at least endeavored to contract 
his sleep into very narrow space. He would 
go to sleep in his chair, holding a little ball 
over a tin basin or bell ; and as soon as he was 
fairly asleep the ball would drop, and the 
sound would wake him. A few such naps, as 
he believed, answered his purpose, and thus he 
seemed to save half his night for study. 

This last case, I do not recommend to you 
as an example ; but it shows to what a pitch 
this moral heroism is sometimes carried. It 
shows you, too, that time redeemed, is worth 
something. 



LETTER IX. 

CORRECT CONVERSATION. 

One means of self-education — a most import- 
ant means, too — is conversation. Indeed, the 
art of conversing correctly should be always 
made a part of the education of our families 
and our schools. It is of a thousand times 
more consequence than some of the subjects 
which are made so prominent there, especially 
during the earlier years of life. 

How many of you were drilled, for example, 
every day, or nearly every day of your school 
education, for months and years, in what is 
commonly called English Grammar ! And 
to what purpose? Were you made either 
wiser or better for it ? Was it not, to you, a 
sort of confusion, rather than any thing which 



CORRECT CONVERSATION. 91 

justly deserves the name of real knowledge J 
Were you not, in truth, disgusted with it ? 

Some of you, who have in your turn become 
teachers, may have found use for it, when it 
became necessary that, in order to please 
parents and comply with fashion, you must 
teach the same unintelligible jargon to your 
own pupils. I do not say that even this use is 
to be commended. I only speak of it as a 
commodity, for which now-a-days there is a 
market. 

Suppose, that the same amount of time 
which is spent on "grammar" were spent on 
conversation. English Grammar is said to be 
the art of speaking and writing our language 
correctly. But in order to write the language 
correctly, we should first know how to speak 
it correctly. What is correct writing, or good 
composition, but good conversation transferred 
to paper ? 

From the first moment you began to talk, all 
the way through your family and school edu- 
cation, care should have been taken to have 
you talk right. Force, distinctness, clearness, 
propriety — all, in truth, that makes conversa- 



92 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

tion answer best the designs of the Creator — 
should have been attended to most assiduously. 
There should have been no mumbling, no 
confusion, no hesitancy, no repetition, no un- 
meaning words or phrases, no vulgarisms, and 
no double negatives. 

Has this been your lot ? If so, that lot has 
been singularly happy. Nine in ten of our 
youth of both sexes — I might say, as I have 
reason to fear, nineteen-twentieths — receive 
a very different treatment. They are spoiled 
from the first in the family, and what is " bred 
in the bone," as the vulgar saying is, " stays 
long in the flesh." The schools do not correct 
the error. 

It is surprising what an amount of ungram- 
matical stuff is tolerated among us. " I han't 
got no book f or "I can't get so long a lesson, 
I don't think ;" or " Please, sir, John is a pinch- 
in' on me ;" or other equally incorrect and un- 
grammatical expressions, are carried through 
the schools — grammar, as it is called, both 
English and Latin, to the contrary notwith- 
standing. 

Now let me entreat those who read this 



CORRECT CONVERSATION. 93 

letter, and who, though pronounced gramma- 
rians by the constituted authorities, yet " mur- 
der the King's English" at every step they 
take, to reflect on the predicament in which 
they have been placed, and resolve at once to 
escape it. The task is not so difficult as they 
may at first suppose— the greatest difficulty is 
in resolving and beginning. 

But you will hardly emancipate yourselves 
alone. Do not undertake the work, therefore, 
single-handed. Call to your aid some kind 
friend — one, it may happen, who himself needs 
the same sort of discipline, and who in teaching 
may learn, and in giving retain. A brother, 
or a sister, or even a neighbor or a schoolfellow, 
will serve your purpose very well. Or, per- 
haps, you may draft to your aid two or three. 
The more, the better, provided they work in 
the right spirit. 

She whom you choose as a companion for 
life will be a more efficient helper in the work 
than any other individual — but alas ! her as- 
sistance often comes late. The work of refor- 
mation, in this particular, ought to be com- 



94 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

pleted long before you enter into the matri- 
monial relation. 

One means of correct conversation consists 
in teaching others to speak correctly. Some 
little child, in whose society you find yourself, 
will need to be set right from day to day ; and 
nothing will have a better effect to confirm, in 
you, good habits, than endeavoring to confirm 
them in a child. You thus learn from happy 
experience the truth of the saying, He that 
watereth shall himself be watered. 

Another useful practice is to write out a list, 
from day to day, of those incorrect words and 
phrases which you are most anxious to avoid. 
You will be surprised, no doubt, at the large- 
ness of the list ; and perhaps, at times, feel 
discouraged. But never give up the contest ; 
for you will overcome, at length, if you faint 
not. 

Let me not be understood as objecting wholly 
to the study of English Grammar ; for there 
is a way and a time for this branch. What is 
wanted, however, in early life, is correct con- 
versation ; a style of conversation from mere 



CORRECT CONVERSATION. 95 

habit that is exactly in accordance with the 
rules of the language. And then, at a some- 
what later period of your school studies, a 
course of lessons on the philosophy of that 
language which you have already learned to 
speak and write correctly from mere habit, may 
be useful. 

It has long been a fundamental maxim with 
grammarians, that they who are learning to 
compose their sentences with accuracy and 
order, are learning at the same time to think 
with accuracy and order. But it is also true, 
and in a degree still more striking, that they 
who are learning to speak correctly, are at the 
same time learning to compose accurately. 

But I will not dwell on this topic too long ; 
for it is one of the plainest things in the world, 
that correct conversation is grammatical ; and 
that correct or grammatical conversation from 
the cradle upward, in all the circumstances of 
recreation or employment in which we are 
placed, would insure correct composition. 

Let the work of correct conversation, then, 
begin where it ought. Let it begin, moreover. 



96 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

immediately. Let us not speak incorrectly at 
home, and elsewhere, all our early years, and 
then expect a few lessons, or a few days at the 
school, will set all right. 



LETTER X. 

THE SCHOOLS. 

Some among you, after reading my last letter, 
may be ready to infer that I am unfriendly to 
the schools. Nothing, however, could be more 
incorrect than such an inference. 

For though I am not much indebted to them, 
at least directly, yet I doubt whether you can 
find one man in a thousand who thinks more 
highly of them than I do. Besides teach- 
ing about ten years, lecturing to thousands 
of them on physiology, &c., I have probably 
visited more schools in the United States 
than any other individual. And I still visit 
them — for the mere love 1 bear them. It is 
but a short time since I visited nine of them 
in a single day. 
5 



98 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

But to value the schools highly, in view of 
what they might accomplish, is one thing — to 
be satisfied with them, quite another. For. 
saying nothing more about the stupidity of 
studying English Grammar for months and 
years to no purpose, or to a purpose worse 
than none, I am quite disgusted with the com- 
mon practice of dabbling with almost every 
thing — i.e. with the elements of almost every 
thing — and being thorough in nothing. 

Were it so that we could have these schools 
what they ought to be — what they must one 
day become — places where every individual 
might obtain, free of any direct tax, the ele- 
ments or keys of all that is indispensable to a 
thorough English education, and at the same 
time have hours enough each day for labor 
and study, I should be as strong a friend of 
schools as any other individual. Indeed, to 
repeat what I have already said, I value them, 
now, with all their defects ; especially when I 
think what they may, and will, and must be- 
come. 

But in order to derive the greatest possible 
advantage from these schools, your time should 



THE SCHOOLS. 99 

not be spent in learning to read, at random, the 
thoughts of others to which your minds are not 
yet adequate ; nor in special lessons daily in 
writing, composition, &c. You should make 
your own reading lessons for several of the 
first of your school years. These reading les- 
sons will, at the same time, form your best 
compositions, to which, however, should be 
added letter-writing, and keeping a journal. 
And in doing all this, you will not fail to learn 
to write. 

There is little difficulty in making your 
own sentences, written on your slates or black 
boards, form at the same time your principal 
lessons — and this for years — in spelling, de- 
fining, reading,* writing, arithmetic, grammar, 
geography, and history. Two years spent in 
this way, would give the keys of learning; 
which is all that is usually got in ten years. 
With the keys in your hands, and with suit- 
able books and teachers, you might now ob- 
tain, in the common schools, all that is valuable 
in our best university education— except, per- 
haps, that which pertains exclusively to what 
are called the learned professions. It is down- 



100 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

right folly to be ten, twelve, or fourteen years, in 
trying to get hold of the keys, and then never 
getting them. It reminds one too much of the 
condition of old Tantalus. 

But do not be impatient because you cannot 
do all you wish in these schools. They are 
essentially republican in their structure. Here 
meet together — if not now, it will ere long be so 
— the high and the low, the rich and the poor, 
the bond and the free. Here they are edu- 
cated, or at least instructed, not as lords and 
vassals, but as brethren. 

These schools, however, would be worth 
much more, as republican institutions, if they 
were places of education as well as of instruc- 
tion. To give our citizens, tis a mass, the 
mere keys of learning, though a good thing, 
comes far enough short of what is needed. Is 
not the body worthy of some good degree of 
attention as well as the mind ? Why should 
not the schools give us the keys of health as 
well as of science ? Is the latter of so much 
value, and the former hardly worth a lesson, 
or even a thought ? 

And why not, too, the keys of virtue and 



THE SCHOOLS. 101 

purity, as well as of knowledge and health ? 
Is it nothing to be good, and virtuous, and 
happy ? What good purpose would it answer 
to give a whole generation the keys of health 
and knowledge, and set them to using them, 
while they were made no better able nor any 
more disposed to unlock and use the still more 
— I was going to say infinitely more — valua- 
ble treasures to fallen man — morality and re- 
ligion ? Would Satan be made better and hap- 
pier, simply by being made wiser and health- 
ier ? Would he not be made, by just so much 
as he was made to know more, only the more 
truly and completely devil ? 

How strange it is that the schools — with 
few exceptions — have done little more than to 
teach the young to find their level in a society 
which is theoretically republican, and which 
ought to be so practically ! I do most ardently 
desire to live till the blessed day shall arrive, 
when the young will be taught, in all our 
schools, from the highest to the lowest, the 
essentials of that which will make them, at 
once, healthier, wiser, and better ! 

There are a thousand little habits of conduct 



102 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

and conversation which should be taught the 
young at school, which, weighed in the true 
balances, would be found far more valuable in 
their bearing on life and life's great ends, than 
mere book-knowledge. The time will come, 
sooner or later, when the schools will teach all 
this. 

Till that time, I say once more, have a little 
patience ; but, then, do not be inactive. You 
may by your own effort, as a pupil in the 
schools, or afterward as teacher or proprietor, 
do much to hasten that glad day. So that if 
the schools cannot be, in your own time, what 
you desire, they may be so in your children's 
day — or in that of your children's children. 
For you live for the race, or should do so, no 
less than for yourselves as individuals. 



LETTER XL 

THE LOVE AND SPIRIT OF PROGRESS. 

Is it thought that the views I have presented, 
when writing on self-dependence and self-edu- 
cation, do not quite harmonize with those of 
my last letter ? That at one time, I teach the 
young man that his great business is to edu- 
cate himself, and at another, that the schools 
are useful as a means of educating him — both 
of which cannot be true ? 

Now I do not think there is any discrepancy 
of the kind to be found in my letters. I have 
not said, either in one place or another, that we 
cannot be educated, — nay, even instructed — 
without the aid of the schools. Neither have 
I said that the schools might not be made to 
assist us — not by educating us, so much, as 



104 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

• 

by giving us the means of educating ourselves. 
The latter they most certainly might do for us ; 
and I trust one day will. This is about all 
they can profitably do ; though even this is 
not to be despised. 

After all, it is not the schools that are to 
make us what we ought to be — nor is it any 
array of means or machinery, whether of hu- 
man or divine ordination. If a young man 
intends to be any thing in this world, he must 
possess, somehow or other, the love of improve- 
ment — and a zeal as strong as his love. He 
must "hunger and thirst" to make progress. 

He must not only desire, generally, to be- 
come wiser and better, but he must embody 
this desire, as it were, by carrying it into par- 
ticulars. Many hunger and thirst enough ; 
but take no such measures as they ought, to 
allay their hunger, or slake their thirst. They 
resolve, it may be, and re-resolve, and yet go 
on, (and even go on till they die,) of the same 
character they always have been. 

Now such persons must cease to deal so 
much in generals — never coming to particulars. 
They are like the theoretically benevolent, who 



LOVE AND SPIRIT OF PROGRESS. 105 

are always mourning over a world's miseries 
in general, but never doing any thing, in par- 
ticular, to relieve them. They must become 
practical penitents, or their penitence will be 
of little avail. 

For example, when they rise in the morning, 
they must make resolutions and lay plans, not 
for life in general, and somewhere, and at 
some time or other, but for that day specific- 
ally. The question should be, What ought I to 
do, that is practical, in the way of self-improve- 
ment, to-day ? And this question being settled, 
good resolutions should immediately follow. 
And good resolutions being made, they should 
be lived up to. Or, finally, if not lived up to, we 
should be as in sackcloth and ashes on account 
of it. 

I have spoken of the schools and of self- 
education. Now give me but the love of pro- 
gress — the desire of improvement — the never- 
ending hunger and thirst after righteousness — 
and it matters but little about the schools. 
What schools they are ; where they are ; what 
their forms or methods ; how long we attend 
them — these are all things of comparatively 

5* 



106 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Jittle importance. They may have their use — 
they do have it ; they serve to feed in us the 
heaven-like flame, instead of quenching it. 
And this, to express again, though in different 
words, the same idea, is their legitimate office. 

I have seen scores of people who hungered 
and thirsted after more knowledge, and who 
contrived to bring much of it within their 
grasp. I knew a female, who, though mistress 
of a large family and intensely occupied in 
taking the sole charge of them, contrived to 
slake her thirst and appease her hunger for 
books. No female I ever knew worked 
harder ; and yet few whom I have known 
ever read more. And it was read to good pur- 
pose. It was understood and remembered. 
It was even more than this ; it was marked, 
learned, and inwardly digested. 

And yet I sometimes doubted — for I knew 
well the circumstances — whether this female 
was made a whit the better for all this, A 
boy of ten years of age, of the same habits, 
seemed none the better for it, but the worse. 
Both loved to become wiser ; both, perhaps, 
had a feeble, half formed desire to become bet- 



LOVE AND SPIRIT OF PROGRESS. 107 

ter ; but still nothing was done to effect what 
was but faintly desired. 

It has been partially admitted that there are 
many among us — some scores at least — who 
desire to become wiser, though they do not 
give evidence that they care to become better. 
But I recall. From all I can learn in the case, 
they are seeking — hungering and thirsting for — 
mere gratification, with as little thought or care 
whether it will or will not make them any 
better, as those persons have who are eating 
and drinking what tickles their appetite and 
satisfies the cravings, or at least the gnaw- 
ings, of their stomachs. Can we say, in these 
circumstances, that they give evidence of a 
love of progress or desire for improvement ? 

He who has that most excellent trait of 
character of which I am now speaking, is not 
only solicitous to have every thing he says 
and does have a good effect upon him, physi- 
cally and morally, but, at times, painfully 
suspicious lest they should have the contrary 
effect. He might, in many a reflecting 
moment, adopt the soliloquy of Mr. Burgh, in 
his " Dignity of Human Nature :" 



108 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

" Dost thou, Oh my soul, constantly watch 
over thyself? Dost thou suspect every other 
person, lest his example, or influence, mislead 
thee? Dost thou often and regularly medi- 
tate on thy ways, and examine thy heart and 
life? Dost thou perfectly know thy own 
weakness ? Hast thou all thy infirmities en- 
graven on thy remembrance? Dost thou 
habitually labor to make sure of keeping 
within bounds ? Dost thou often deny thy- 
self rather than run the smallest hazard of 
offending?" 

I would give more for the love of progress 
in son or daughter, than for almost any merely 
intellectual or moral qualification below the 
sun. It is a trait of character which is the 
more valuable from the fact that it so well be- 
comes creatures like ourselves — expressly made 
for it. We do not know that angels and seraphs 
are constructed, in their natures, on the same 
plan. But ourselves we know better — over 
ourselves we have control ; so God has order- 
ed it. 

See, then, that you possess the quality to 
which I have alluded in these paragraphs. 



LOVE AND SPIRIT OF PROGRESS. 109 

Of whatever else you may be deprived, lose 
not the golden treasure of a true hungering 
and thirsting after improvement in knowledge 
and piety. Let your path, in every important 
respect, be that of the just, which shineth 
brighter and brighter unto the perfect day. 



LETTER XII. 

LOVE OF INQUIRY, OR FREE-THINKING. 

It is too late in the day of human progress — 
the progress, I mean, of the race — to exhort 
young men to shun free inquiry and free- 
thinking. In truth, it is a piece of advice 
which in any age of the world, above all in 
our own, I should have no disposition to give. 
Both these, on the contrary, I would encourage. 
There is, however, a slight difference be- 
tween the two, as may be seen by a moment's 
reflection. Free inquiry would lead us to in- 
vestigate, unshackled, any subject, which in 
itself is worthy of our attention. Free-thinking 
may or may not be disposed to make inquiry. 
It only assumes the right of forming unbiased 
opinions on all subjects that come before the 



FREE-THINKING. Ill 

mind's eye, whether they be few or many; 
and whether they are forced upon it — the mind 
itself being passive — or are dug out, like the 
gold of California. 

I have said that to neither of these I had 
any sort of objection ; and more than this, that 
I would encourage both. And I most ardently 
desire that every young man, as soon as he 
thinks at all, will be in the highest and most 
important sense of the word, a free-thinker. 

It is a low and partial view of this sub- 
ject that leaves an impression on the minds 
of some of our older or middle-aged people, 
that free-thinking is synonymous with skepti- 
cism ; that a man who thinks freely, espe- 
cially a person who is young and inexperi- 
enced, must almost of necessity think wrong, 
&c. Such a view, besides being low, seems 
to me an impeachment of the wisdom and 
goodness of God. For as he most obviously 
created man to think, and in every age has 
required him to think, to assume that in think- 
ing freely he will almost inevitably think 
wrong — is it not akin to blasphemy? At 
least, is it not irreverent ? 



112 LETTERS TO YOUXG MEN. 

That not a few free-thinkers have become 
skeptical, is admitted. But that free-thinking 
in its own nature, tends to skepticism, can 
never be true. Bacon, indeed, says that "a 
little knowledge inclineth man's mind to athe- 
ism : but depth in knowledge bringeth it about 
to true religion. " But then there are two things 
to be considered here ; first, that atheism is not 
exactly synonymous with skepticism : and 
secondly, that the little knowledge of which 
he speaks is not the knowledge of the free- 
thinker, but of him who does not think freely. 

Greatly do I rejoice when I find a young 
man who thinks, even if his road should 
chance to lead through skepticism. I found a 
boy the other day. scarcely six years of age, 
who was constantly thinking and inquiring. 
Nothing came before his eye which did not 
excite his most earnest attention, and lead him 
to his father. What is this for. father] he 
would say. And what is that? And the 
answers to the first inquiries would lead to 
others, sometimes almost innumerable. 

Such a father may think his case a hard 



FREE-THINKING. 



113 



one, and it may be so to him who does not 
understand the matter. It may even be 
thought a heavy tax upon his time. To me, 
however, such taxation would be no tyranny. 
On the contrary, I should rejoice that God had 
given me an inquisitive son. He might, for 
aught I should know, become a skeptic ; but 
I should hope better things. I should hope 
that depth in knowledge would bring him 
about to true religion in the end. And of one 
thing I should be certain, viz : that if he ever 
came to true religion, he would not be a super- 
ficial; but a thorough Christian. 

Fear not, then, to indulge in freedom of 
thinking ; and to love and practise free in- 
quiry. To do this is your natural and inalien- 
able right — born, as you are, a republican and 
not a monarchist — a Christian, and not a 
Turk or a Pagan. It is guarantied you by 
the constitution of the country you live in ; it 
is guarantied you by the principles of Protest- 
antism ; it is guarantied you by God himself. 

In regard to the requirements of Protestant- 
ism in this matter, allow me to quote from the 



114 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

farewell discourse or- address of Rev. Mr. Rob- 
inson to the Pilgrims, as they have been called 
— I mean the emigrants from Europe who 
first settled New England. 

" I charge you before God and his blessed 
angels, that you follow me no farther than 
you have seen me follow the Lord Jesus 
Christ. The Lord has more truth yet to break 
forth out of his Holy Word. I cannot suffi- 
ciently bewail the condition of the reformed 
churches who are come to a period in their 
religion. I will go at present no farther than 
the instruments of their reformation. Luther 
and Calvin were great and shining lights in 
their times, yet they penetrated not into the 
whole counsel of God. I beseech you remem- 
ber it, 'tis an article of your church covenant, 
that you be ready to receive whatever truth 
shall be made known to you from the written 
word of God." 

This is the voice of a free-thinker — a friend 
of free inquiry— a man who in all ages will be 
deemed a great man, because he thought and 
inquired, freely and gave it in charge to others, 
even as friends of religion and religious truth. 



FREE-THINKING. 115 

to do the same. Here was no fear of skepti- 
cism, open or covert. My own belief is — and 
such I doubt not has been the belief of many 
a man of thought and inquiry, John Robinson 
among the rest — that there is no such effectual 
antidote to licentiousness and skepticism in 
these matters, as true free-thinking, and true 
free inquiry. 

Still it would be the height of weakness in 
me or any other individual, to take the ground 
which some have taken, that what is most 
wanted in society is to have men — young and 
old — be induced to think. Now I acknowledge 
there is not much thought in the world. I 
wish as much as any man there were more. 
But then, another thing is more needed among 
us — much more — viz : thinking right. And 
superadded to both these, as their crowning 
glory, should be another thing still, viz : feel- 
ing right. Feelings I grant, is blind ; but 
then, when guided by reason, is of inestimable 
importance. 

This may be the proper place to say a little 
more distinctly than I have yet done, that I 
would never encourage the society of either 



116 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

books or men, who under the pretence of free 
inquiry, would lead you to sneer at every thing 
which is established, merely because it is es- 
tablished. Opinions in religion, politics, phi- 
losophy, &c, are not necessarily erroneous, 
because established. 

In my boyhood, I took up one day, for peru- 
sal, one of the volumes of Thomas Paine. 
He was, as you know, not only a free-thinker, 
but a skeptic. I was, moreover, of the same 
turn and tendency. Many of his thoughts on 
politics, I had long before read and imbibed. 
But here he was assailing Christianity. Hav- 
ing read a few pages, I threw aside the book 
in disgust. I had looked for /ree-thinking, 
instead of which I found no thinking. The 
veriest child who had read the New Testament 
might have seen it. 

I wondered, when I reflected on the subject, 
how so many could be enamored of the wri- 
tings of Paine — a man who, though possessed 
of much intellectual power, would nevertheless 
stoop to sneer at what he had, most certainly, 
never examined. If this volume is a fair 



FREE-THINKING. 117 

specimen of the man, it is not to be wondered 
at that while he has so many followers in poli- 
tics, he has so few in religion. 

While, therefore, I counsel you to be men 
of free inquiry, I wish you to understand, 
most distinctly, that there is a sort of pseudo 
free inquiry abroad, which I would have you 
avoid. It will do you no good ; it will be a 
waste of your time as well as energy. Life is 
long enough for free inquiry ; but not long 
enough for sneering, or even for trifling. 



• LETTER XIII. 

THE RIGHT USE OF OURSELVES. 

Much is said, in these days — something has 
been said even in my former letters — about the 
importance, to the young especially, of study- 
ing themselves. "Know thyself," we have 
been told, is a maxim of thousands of years' 
standing ; and yet, a maxim which passes 
almost wholly unheeded. Even the knowledge 
of our physical frames — their structure, laws 
and relations ; or, in other words, Anatomy, 
Physiology, and Hygiene — is one of the last 
things, as I have shown, which young men 
study, or are required to study. Greek, Latin, 
Mathematics, &c, are permitted to occupy their 
attention, to the exclusion of this species of 
self-knowledge. 



RIGHT USE OF OURSELVES. 119 

And this complaint, when it does not arise 
from mere querulousness, or from that species 
of old age which ever complains of the pres- 
ent, while it places the golden age always in 
the past, is not without just foundation. We 
know something, or at least attempt to know 
something, of every body else — noble or igno- 
ble, affluent or indigent, bond or free, colored 
or white. We know something, as we have 
seen, of the three kingdoms of nature, all 
except ourselves. 

We explore continent, island, ocean, air. We 
dig deep the bowels of the earth, and soar 
among clouds, if not stars. Nay, we even 
survey, by the aid of the telescope, other 
worlds ; and if we do not become omnipresent 
or omniscient, we seem to be almost so. Yet 
after all, we come back to the " house we* live 
in," utterly ignorant of its structure, laws or 
relations — ten to one if we are not ignorant of 
the number of its apartments, or the nature 
and character of its furniture. 

Of our minds, too, we are almost as ignorant 
as of our bodies. Nor do the schools — though 
they may do much — ever take up this subject, 



120 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

as it ought to be taken up. Nor do reformers 
of society — the physiological reformers perhaps 
excepted — ever dwell very much on this great 
subject. 

Something, then, being obviously wrong, what 
is to be done ? On this topic I shall endeavor 
to dwell, at greater length, in my next letter 
— that on Physiology. We will dismiss this 
part of oik subject, then, for the present. 

There is one thing of which we are still 
more ignorant than of ourselves, viz. the right 
use of ourselves. Of this ignorance, one author 
at least — Mudie, in his " Observation of Na- 
ture," — has taken notice. How little know we 
of the right use of ourselves, as a whole ! And 
how much less of the right use of the various 
parts composing the whole ! 

Man, I have said, is made up, as Paul ex- 
presses it, of body, head, and heart ; or, as the 
moderns have it, of a physical, an intellectual, 
and a moral nature. Is the right use of each 
of these grand divisions of humanity well 
understood ? 

Man is made, in the moral department, for 
example, to do good. Has the science of doing 



RIGHT USE OF OURSELVES. 121 

good — the science of benevolence, or rather of 
philanthropy — been much studied ? And does 
a young man understand rightly, the use of 
himself, who does not understand this noble 
science ? 

But leaving these grand divisions of our- 
selves, let us be a little more particular. The 
physical part of our being, like our moral and 
intellectual, has its various subdivisions. Thus 
we have many and different systems, as they 
are called, united, as we have before seen, 
under one federal head. We have the nervous 
system, the circulatory system, the digestive 
system, the respiratory system, &c. Then, 
again, we have the five senses, hearing, seeing, 
tasting, smelling and feeling. And once more, 
still, we have head, body, hands, feet, &c. 

Take the hand. Who is there among us 
that knows, to the full extent, the right use of 
this little organ ? I do not mean to ask, who 
knows the extent to which its powers may be 
developed and cultivated, for this would be too 
broad a topic for discussion here ; but merely 
the uses to which the Creator intended it 
should be applied. 
6 



122 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

How far it should be used in the arts, how 
far in manufactures, how far in the daily cus- 
toms and personal habits of life, and when 
and where machinery ought to be substituted, 
are questions which have seldom been asked. 
The Germans have a proverb, " Never touch 
your eye, except with your elbow." The inter- 
dict might be extended to the ear, the nostrils, 
the mouth, &c. Do you say that these are 
small matters ? — Granted ; but " who hath de- 
spised the day of small things V Or, if they 
are to be despised or overlooked, as matters of 
fact, they may at least serve the purpose of 
illustration. 

Take, again, the human lungs. Remarks 
concerning these will not surely be regarded 
as small matters. What, then, is their use 1 
or, rather, what are their uses ? First, they aid 
in forming the blood. The chyle is not fully 
changed into the former fluid, till it has passed 
into the lungs, and been spread over the sur- 
face of those air bladders, or small hollow cells, 
of which the lungs are so largely made up. 
Secondly, the lungs are the chief organ for 
purifying the blood, after it has become partly 



RIGHT USE OF OURSELVES. 123 

spoiled in its ordinary circulation. Thirdly, 
they are the great fireplace of the " house we 
live in ;" or, in other words, they are the prin- 
cipal caloric agent of the human system. 

But I will not enlarge. These illustrations 
must suffice. No higher subject can be pre- 
sented to young men than the right use of 
themselves ; especially when we affix to this 
phrase the highest and truest definition. For 
will it not include the whole circle of human 
duty — to ourselves, the world, and God ? 

I grant, indeed, that merely to know the 
right use of ourselves is not all. To use our- 
selves according to the Divine intention, is of 
greater importance still. Would that young 
men understood the right use of themselves in 
all respects, and would govern themselves 
accordingly. For as is the young man, indi- 
vidually or collectively, so is the old ; so, even, 
is society. 

Were the young to use themselves rightly 
through half a dozen generations — were they 
to make the same untiring effort to answer the 
great Creator's purposes throughout, that they 
now do to elevate themselves without regard 



124 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN, 

to duty, the world would once more become as 
Eden, and the desert rejoice and blossom as 
the rose. 

I must here urge on you the study of the 
great laws of health and life, as developed by 
the science of Anatomy, Physiology, and Hy- 
giene. Few things are more interesting, when 
the subject is made intelligible, and fewer still 
are more important. In another letter, I will 
throw out a few hints on this great subject. 
Not that I shall attempt to teach largely this 
great threefold science, but only show that it 
should be taught, and endeavor to inspire you 
with the desire to be made acquainted with it. 
For to create the desire, is to go full half way 
in accomplishing it. 



LETTER XIV. 



PHYSIOLOGY. 



By Physiology, in the popular acceptation 
of that term, is meant all such knowledge as 
pertains to the physical education and man- 
agement of human beings. It is in this sense 
that I use it, when I commend the science to 
your favorable notice and regard. 

The study of man — the physical depart- 
ment, I mean, of this great science — is usually 
divided, as I told you in my last letter, into 
three great branches. First, Anatomy, which 
is the study of the human body, in regard to 
its framework. We take the body in pieces, 
as we would a watch, and find out all its parts 
and their uses. Secondly, Physiology, which 
teaches us the laws of life ; or the knowledge 



126 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

of the play of the human machinery. This 
branch might be very rapidly taught, could 
we look through the healthy living body, and 
see all parts in motion, and understand that 
motion. Thirdly, Hygiene, as the French call 
it ; or the study of the laws of relation. By 
this we mean, man's relation to air, water, and 
all the things or bodies around him, whether 
solid, liquid, or gaseous. Our health depends 
on our obedience to all the laws of these three 
great departments, especially the latter. 

It is not pretended, of course, that such a 
knowledge of this great subject is needed by 
young men, as that which becomes a matter 
of necessity to the medical man, or the sur- 
geon. He must not only have the same 
general knowledge which is needed by every 
young man, but a particular knowledge, so 
thorough as to be able to tell, when a finger is 
applied to any part of the surface of the body, 
what lies immediately under — what veins, 
blood-vessels, organs, &c. 

When we announce the subject of Physi- 
ology, for a public lecture, not a few people 
think of it in the sense to which I have just 



PHYSIOLOGY. 127 

referred, as it concerns the medical student. 
And, as a natural and almost necessary conse- 
quence, they revolt from it. " What time or 
means have we," they say, " for understanding 
this subject ? Besides, what good would it do 
us ? We are not to be doctors." 

The same feeling exists, to some extent, 
when we talk of the necessity of having Phy- 
siology taught to children in schools — or, per- 
chance, to Females. u What can possibly be 
the importance, to the young and to our wives, 
of this sort of knowledge ?" they seem to say. 
" What would these innovators in Education 
have ? Why, will they not ere long tell us our 
children must study farriery or ship-building?" 

Others say, "Why! Physiology? What 
does that concern us, here in plain life — we 
who are obliged to earn our bread in the sweat 
of our face ?" as if Physiology was something 
like star-gazing, or star-studying. Or, as if he 
who studied it must at least come to know 
under what planet he was born, and whether, 
in his temperament, he is ruled by Mars, 
Venus, or Mercury. 

Others, again, who admit, in part, the utility 



128 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

of this science, as it is taught by its most com- 
petent professors or teachers, seem to suppose 
it useful to them as a means of becoming theii 
own doctors, or the doctors of others, when 
they are actually diseased. Of its importance, 
as a means of prevention, they have scarcely 
a single adequate idea. 

When, however, they have read and ap- 
proved of the little work called the " House I 
Live in," and are told they have been all this 
while reading Physiology, they seem to be 
surprised. " Why, if this is Physiology," they 
say, " there can be no objection to having 
every body study it. We should even like to 
study it more ourselves !" And now it be- 
comes a matter of comparatively little diffi- 
culty to introduce it into our schools. 

But I suppose that to several thousands of 
the young men who will read this letter, the 
introduction of Physiology into our schools 
will seem to come too late. They will, indeed, 
rejoice that their younger brothers and sisters 
are privileged so highly ; and that the world, 
in general, is to be thus blessed. But they 



PHYSIOLOGY. 129 

will mourn over their own loss, and ask us how 
it can be in any measure restored. 

What young men of the generation already 
risen have to do for themselves, in this matter, 
is to hear lectures in the first place. Not every 
thing that comes along ; but only such as have 
been most approved. These are of two kinds. 
1st. Those which are illustrated by manikins. 
2d. Those which teach the laws of health, 
without going so much into first principles. 

Among the former are the lectures of Dr. 
Wieting, Dr. Darling, Dr. Cutter, and Mrs. 
Wright. Among the latter are those of Dr. 
Mussey, the Fowlers, Mrs. Gove, and myself.* 
Both these classes of lectures are important. 
The first class give you the outlines or ele- 
ments ; the second go more into detail. Never- 
theless, if you cannot find time to attend to 
them all, at least endeavor to hear the latter. 

These lectures, duly attended to, will rouse 
you to the necessity of reading something on 
the same subject. You will find no periodical 

* Mr. Graham's Lectures included both these departments 
— but he seems to have withdrawn from the field. 



130 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

exactly adapted to your wants — but many 
volumes of standard works — among which 
are those of the Combes, of Sweetser, of the 
Fowlers, of Graham, and a part of my own 
works. If you read but one, however, read 
Combe's Constitution of Man. 

And if convinced, by lectures, reading and 
reflection, or in any other way, of the vast im- 
portance of obeying not only the great Crea- 
tor's moral laws, but also his physical ones, 
there is one thing more for you to do, and that 
immediately. It is to act up to the knowledge 
you already possess. Do what your con- 
sciences testify to you is right. He that doeth 
truth — moral or physical-^-cometh to the light. 

Really, my young friends, I know of no one 
subject, so rarely forced upon your notice, as 
the world now is, and yet so immensely im- 
portant to your happiness as this same thing 
— this obedience to physical law — the laws 
of Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene. Be 
persuaded then, oh be persuaded, to make 
them, next to the laws contained in the Bible, 
the man of your counsel and the guide of 
your youthful steps. 



PHYSIOLOGY. 131 

In doing so, you will reap a rich reward 
in personal enjoyment. The value of each 
day of your life will be greatly increased ; and 
your loss of time by ill health greatly di- 
minished. You will begin, then, to know 
what was meant by the little scrawl of poetry, 
in the Library of Health, entitled " Morning 
all day." Your strength and vivacity and 
cheerfulness, like mine, will hold out every 
day, till the evening shades appear and beckon 
you to repose. 

' You will also add, under Providence, several 
years to your lives — Dr. Mussey is accustomed 
to say, so it has been reported — about twelve 
or fifteen. I suppose fewer than twelve, how- 
ever. An average increase of five or six years 
to an individual, in the present generation, is 
all I should dare to hope, and almost as much 
as I dare to desire. Sudden and rapid changes 
are seldom durable. 

But if no more than I have supposed can 
be done for the passing generation, much more 
can be done for the next, and for the third still 
more ; and so on. If the work of reformation, 
on physical and physiological principles, can be 



132 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

once fairly begun and properly persevered in, 
I see no reason why life may not be lengthened, 
in the course of five or six centuries, to several 
hundred years, and the value of each year be 
doubled and tripled. 



LETTER XV. 

PHRENOLOGY. 

That Phrenology, in its first or leading prin- 
ciples — that the brain is the material organ of 
the mind, that different mental faculties have 
connection with different parts of the brain, 
&c, &c. — is true, I can no more doubt than I 
could doubt the law of gravitation. But that 
every thing which is called Phrenology is 
worthy of your confidence, is quite another 
question. 

After the study of Physiology, generally, I 
hope you will pay some attention to Phre- 
nology. It is a branch of Physiology, but a 
most important branch. The material organ 
of the mind is not so large as some of the 
other organs of the body — systems, rather — 



134 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

such as the machinery of locomotion or of di- 
gestion ; still it has a very commanding in- 
fluence. It is, to the confederate human sys- 
tem, what Massachusetts is to the confederated 
political system of our country. But of this I 
have spoken elsewhere. 

Of course, I do not expect you to become 
adepts in this science. What you need, is a 
practical general knowledge of the subject, 
such as you may obtain from Combe's and 
Fowler's Phrenology, and from the various 
works, both periodical and otherwise, of these 
two individuals, especially the latter. There 
are two of these Fowlers, however ; but I have 
been most acquainted with the works of the 
eldest, O. S. Fowler. I recommend to you, in 
particular, their Phrenological Journal. They 
have, it may be, their faults ; but they cer- 
tainly have many excellencies. What some 
call visionary in their works, more frequently 
deserves the name of soundly sensible. In truth 
few works in such a style, contain more 
" sound, roundabout common sense," than 
those of the Fowlers. 

As I said of your study of general Physi- 



PHRENOLOGY. 135 

ology, so I must say, and with still more of 
emphasis, in regard to the study of Phrenol- 
ogy, make every thing practical. Apply the 
subject to your own personal improvement, 
either immediately or prospectively. What 
you need, is to be prepared for the great duties 
of life, which are so soon to devolve upon you, 
— some of which, indeed, always have, in a 
degree, borne upon you. There are duties to 
yourself — your friends — the world. There are 
duties to body, and duties to soul. 

Set not out, in these studies, with too many 
prejudices. Hold yourselves every where open 
to conviction. And if convinced you have a 
deficiency in your mental, moral, or corporeal 
structure, seek to supply it in the best possible 
manner. Observe, that I do not say in the 
most speedy manner, for the most rapid cure, 
moral or physical, is seldom so good, in the 
end, as the slower one. Indeed, he who is 
ardent and resolute in the great work of self- 
education and improvement, should ever have 
for his motto : " Make haste slowly." 

There is one fact, which, to my own appre- 
hension, speaks loudly in favor of the study 



136 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

of Phrenology, and indeed of Physiology gen- 
erally. I never met with a man who had read 
the best works, on these subjects, who was not 
much more happy and much more efficient in 
his employment or profession, than he would 
probably have been in his ignorance. 

In traversing our country, I meet with a 
minister, here and there, who has investigated 
this great subject. The style of his preaching 
is much modified by it, His people will some- 
times tell me that he has interested them more 
of late, than formerly ; and they wonder what 
is the cause. Occasionally, I have been struck 
with the power of a preacher in the pulpit who 
was an entire stranger to me ; and on inquiry 
have been not a little gratified to find that he 
had become a student of physical law, no less 
than of moral. 

The other evening I heard an advocate of 
temperance speak. I had heard lectures on 
all departments of this subject before, and had 
lectured much myself. Judge, then, of my 
feelings, when I found near the close of the 
lecture, that he was not merely acquainted 
with the general laws of Physiology, but that 



PHRENOLOGY. 137 

Phrenology was also a favorite study with 
him. 

That I am liable to a little mistake on this 
point, either from prejudice or prepossession, is 
most certainly true. But then I do not believe 
I can be wholly mistaken. When a minister 
preaches in such a manner as to take a new 
hold upon me and every body else — when, in 
fact, he proclaims physical law, no less than 
' moral and religious — I cannot but know it. 

And when I find a young mechanic, or man- 
ufacturer, or farmer, who, by the acknowledg- 
ment of all around him (most of whom know 
not the cause, and can, therefore, have no pre- 
judice against him) has, of late, made great 
progress, especially, as a man of sound sense, 
and has come to tower a head and shoulders, 
like Saul, above his fellows ; and then, on in- 
quiry, I find he has been studying George 
Combe, or O. S. Fowler, or all of us and our 
associates in this department how can I be 
mistaken ? 



LETTER XVI. 

PHYSIOGNOMY. 

I have had some experience in this matter of 
practical Physiognomy, which may possibly 
be of service to young men ; and which I am 
quite willing they should avail themselves of. 
Perhaps, indeed, I set out, in life, with more 
tact at detecting men's character by their faces 
than some people. In any event, I early pos- 
sessed this tact, whether it was acquired or 
natural. 

Without having been a business man, in the 
common sense of the term, I have, for many 
years of my life, had a great deal to do with 
men of business in nearly every possible way. 
I have made it my rule to judge as well as I 
could concerning them, by their features and 
other externals ; and if I thought them worthy 



PHYSIOGNOMY. 139 

of confidence, have taken and treated them as 
honest men till experience compelled me to do 
otherwise. 

Now, in pursuing this course, I have gen- 
erally succeeded in carrying forward my plans, 
though not in every instance, without embar- 
rassment. Had I followed my own first con- 
victions, I should seldom have suffered. In 
nearly every instance in which I have been a 
pecuniary loser — and these instances have been 
frequent — I have suffered from yielding to the 
opinions of others, instead of following my 
own judgment. 

For example, I had bought a building lot, 
and wished to dig a cellar, and proceed to 
erect a house. While surveying the site, a 
stranger came to me — indeed the people of the 
neighborhood were all strangers to me — and 
wished to dig my cellar. I was not pleased 
with his appearance, and did not say much 
about employing him. 

On inquiring, at the village near by, who 
were the best masons in that vicinity, I was at 
once referred to this very same man. Others 
were indeed named, but the former seemed to 



140 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

have the preference. I asked for specimens of 
his work ; they were shown me, and were 
satisfactory. Of his honesty, I could learn 
nothing in particular, or of his general habits. 
It did not, however, appear that he was intem- 
perate or openly vicious. In fine, I yielded to 
the judgment of others, and employed him. 

This was the beginning of a series of diffi- 
culties that never terminated till I had not only 
suffered much, in various ways, especially by 
a total disregard of promise, but had even 
become involved in a serious lawsuit. Where- 
as, had I followed my convictions, concerning 
the indications of his physiognomy, I should 
have escaped. 

It has been so in several other instances. 
The conclusion to which I have been driven 
is, to follow out my convictions of truth and 
duty in these cases for the remainder of my 
days — in other words, to yield to the claims of 
physiognomy. And if you have any tact in 
ascertaining character by the face, I hope you 
will pursue the same course. It may save you 
as many thousands of dollars, as I have lost, 
besides much time and trouble and regret. 



LETTER XVII. 



TRAVELLING. 



Young men, with few exceptions, are fond of 
travelling ; and in these days, the far greater 
part -of them have more or fewer oportunities for 
gratifying their inclination. It is as rare now, 
to find a young man of thirty, who has not 
been beyond the limits of his native state, as it 
was thirty years ago, when I began to be a 
traveller, to find one who had been. 

And yet it is of little consequence to travel, 
if we do not make a wise use of the privilege. 
If all a young man cares for, is to go from 
public house to public house, and eat at the 
most luxurious table, and sleep in the costliest 
apartments, he may almost as well remain 



142 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

within the range of the smoke of his own 
chimney. 

Or if he loves to go abroad, chiefly to note 
the fashions, and watch the different exteriors 
of buildings, villages, and fields — to sneer at 
this, laugh at that, or fall into vexation with 
the other ; — if this is his chief object, he might 
nearly as well be at home. He will certainly 
be more useful at home, if well employed 
there. 

Or if, again, the most he cares for is to break 
life's monotony, " while away " the time, and 
as he is wont to say, enjoy life, when in real- 
ity he only means by enjoying life, laboriously 
doing nothing ; in this case, too, travelling will 
be of very little service to him, as a means of 
making him either wiser or better. Nor will 
it mend the matter much, if he smoke double 
the number of cigars abroad that he does in 
the same time at home.* 

* A ship-master in Barnstable county, Massachusetts, told 
me that in going, a few years since, to Gibraltar, he had a 
passage of thirty-one days, during which time he smoked 800 
good Spanish cigars, besides chewing twenty-four ounces of 
tobacco. A bear, a marmot, or a bat, in a state of hyberna- 



TRAVELLING. 



143 



If temperance, and even abstemiousness are 
required of young men, in order that they may 
be profited, it is above all when they are tra- 
velling. I pity the young man who does not 
understand this, and sometimes wish I could 
point him as an example, to my more fortu- 
nate, and therefore more happy experience. 
Many have been farther from home, while 
few have travelled more than myself. 

This remark may prepare the minds of my 
readers for the assertion, that it does not make 
so much difference as many young men sup- 
pose, where they travel, as the use they make 
of their opportunities. Some will learn more 
by travelling who do not go a thousand miles 
from home, than others who circumnavigate 
the globe. 

1 recommend to every young man, in the 
first place, to travel with his eyes open. I be- 
lieve I have elsewhere said, that one great 
difference among men arises from the fact, that 
some of them see the world as they pass 
through it, while others blunder through it 

tion, had it vocal organs, might as well talk of enjoying life, 
as men who thus stupefy themselves with tobacco. 



144 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

with their eyes half shut. Much of our know- 
ledge, as you know, comes to us through the 
medium of the senses, especially the eyes. 

In the next place, what I would advise you 
to do while reading a book, I would advise 
you to do while travelling, viz. : have a me- 
morandum or blank-book, with a pencil, and 
note down every passing occurrence that in 
any way interests you, and not only note the 
facts, but also your own reflections on them at 
the time. 

If you are skilful at drawing, you will also 
find it useful to sketch many things which you 
observe — not merely a few elegant edifices, 
but curious trees, plants, flowers, implements 
of husbandry, mechanics or manufactures — or 
it may be, some curious bird or animal. Or if 
you are so unfortunate as not to have received 
any instruction in the art of drawing, still I 
would draw as well as possible, and persevere. 
There is much in the little word, try. 

Do not travel merely to tell, when you get 
home, what you have seen, and heard, and 
known ; although you are certainly bound to 
be influenced in some degree, by motives of 



TRAVELLING. 145 

this kind. An Apostle has said, " Forget not 
to do good, and communicate," and one means 
of doing good is to communicate, in one way 
or another, what we have learned. 

Avoid reading while you are travelling. I 
do not presume, in this remark, that any whom 
I address, will read while they are travelling, 
for the sole purpose of making people believe 
they are very learned, or at least very fond of 
learning. And yet I have, in the course of my 
life, met with such persons. I knew one phy- 
sician who used to read in his carriage, for 
the sole purpose, as I then thought— and so 
thought many others— of having the mass of 
those who saw him, believe he was a great 
student. And I have seen a few young per- 
sons of both sexes, who had a great many 
books around them, for the very same reason 
that they had a great deal of furniture in their 
rooms— not that it was needful, but to make 
a fine appearance. 

In general, walk the country, if you can 

afford to do so. Never ride, if you can help it. 

I grant there are many difficulties in the way of 

walking ; but then there are many advantages. 

7 



146 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

One is, that you will be at liberty to stop when 
and where you please, in order to note facts, 
or make your sketches or observations. But I 
have not time to enter upon the reasons very 
fully. 

Should you need examples of the kind to 
encourage you, they are at hand. We need 
not speak of those ancient times, when almost 
every body walked, but may as well come 
near our own. Alfred the Great was a walker. 
So was the famous Count Fellenberg, of Hof- 
wyl, in Switzerland. Wealthy as he was, he 
made the tour of Europe on foot, and this, too, 
of choice. I once planned to do so, but was 
prevented from carrying my plan into execu- 
tion. Burritt, the learned blacksmith, travels 
much, as I understand, in the same way. 

One or two cautions will be necessary be- 
fore I conclude. Most travellers, in passing 
through a country, see only some of its larger 
features, so to call them. They see the high 
mountains, the large rivers, lakes, and cas- 
cades, the caves and hot-springs, and the 
larger cities and villages, but pass over the 
smaller things. Still more apt are they to 



fT 2 T^ 

TRAVELLING. 147 

forget to notice men, and above all, to study 
character. Remember that the study of the 
Christian temple— the human being— is of far 
more consequence to you, as a young man, 
than the study of St. Paul's, or St. Peter's, or 
Westminster Abbey. 

Remember, too, wherever you go, the rights 
of your fellow-travellers, both as regards seats 
and a thousand other things. Some young 
men are so exceedingly selfish, that they will 
not rise up before the old— hardly before wo- 
men and children. Nor is this all. If they 
have offensive personal habits, they are not at 
all careful to conceal them— partly, it may be, 
because they are among strangers. A young 
man will smoke in company, if he may, when 
among strangers, who would not venture to do 
so, in similar circumstances, at home. 

Finally— for I must not enlarge— remember 
in travelling, more than almost any where 
else, the good old maxim, "Every one should 
mind his own business." Do not suppose the 
injunction clashes with one already given— to 
do good and communicate. What I now say 
has regard to your own personal safety and 



148 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

happiness, more than any thing else. Some 
young men are always getting into difficulty 
when they travel, go where they may ; while 
others never have much trouble any where. 
The latter you will find, on a close examina- 
tion, mind their own business — the former do 
not. They can scarcely go from Boston to 
Cambridge, or from New- York to Brooklyn, 
without getting into difficulty, or, at least, 
without carrying bowie-knife or pistol. 

I had the pleasure of an intimate acquaint- 
ance with the late Rev. Wm. C. Woodbridge, 
the Geographer. Few men of fifty years of 
age, have travelled more than he. Besides 
being familiar with nearly every part of the 
United States, he went for several successive 
winters to the West Indies, and made three or 
four voyages to Europe and the Mediterranean. 
In middle-Europe, or in various parts of Ger- 
many, and in Switzerland, he resided as many 
as six or eight years ; perhaps eight or ten. 
In truth, he was as familiar with many of the 
countries and cities of both the Old and the 
New World, as most of us are with the town 
and county in whch we reside. And yet I have 



TRAVELLING. 149 

heard this same Mr. Woodbridge affirm, that 
he never, in all his life, carried with him any 
weapon of defence — not so much as a cane ; 
and what is still more to the point, never had 
the slightest occasion to use any such weapon. 
While it is literally true, that a young relative 
of his at Cambridge, was unwilling to cross 
the bridge to Boston unarmed. 

a Alcott," said an old schoolmaster and tra- 
veller, to me one day, thirty years ago, as I 
was about to set out on a long journey, "I 
have travelled in thirteen of the United States, 
and never yet had a quarrel with any man.' 7 
"Can you tell me your secret," I said, "for pre- 
serving peace ? "I have no secret about it," 
he replied, "except to mind my own business." 

This lesson, as I trust, was not lost upon 
me. I have been a traveller in more than 
thirteen States, and have been familiar with 
almost every town, and village, and neighbor- 
hood in some of them, without having a quar- 
rel, or the beginning of a quarrel with a single 
individuaL 

So it is, in no small degree, in regard to 
the danger of being molested in travelling. 



150 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

I grant there are dangers to be encountered 
from accident and otherwise. I grant there 
are dangerous places. The worst, however, 
are those into which you are likely to be led 
by your appetites, lusts, or passions. As to 
the danger of being attacked, &c, I have 
found that they who take a prudent care of 
themselves, usually go safe through the world; 
while those who do not mind their own busi- 
ness, are the very persons who tell you about 
their hair-breadth dangers and escapes, and 
how necessary it is for you to arm yourself 
against those dangers. 



LETTER XVIII. 

CONSCIENTIOUSNESS. 

It has been said that there is not much con- 
scientiousness in the world. By this however 
is meant, as I suppose, that there is not much, 
in comparison of what there should be. For 
if, by conscientousness, or conscience, is meant 
a sense of right and wrong, there must be a 
degree of conscientiousness, one would think, 
in every human being who has passed the 
merest threshold of existence. But a trifling 
degree or amount, so to speak, of this quality, 
multiplied by the hundreds of millions that 
inhabit our earth at a given time, is an aggre- 
gate not to be despised. It supposes, or rather 
proves, a condition of things very different 
from what would be in a world which consci- 



152 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

entiousness had not yet entered, or from which 
it had been entirely eradicated. 

It is no part of my purpose to enter, here, 
upon the mooted discussion what conscience 
is. On the contrary, I take for granted, what 
I am sure nobody will dispute, that every one 
has this conscience ; and proceed to such a 
course of remark, as I think the urgency of the 
case demands. 

For that the case is an urgent one, no one at 
all acquainted with the facts, will for a moment 
presume to doubt. I admit — I have already 
done it — that there is an aggregate of consci- 
entiousness in the world, that is by no means 
despisable. The Pagan has it, when he hangs 
on hooks fastened to his flesh, or throws him- 
self under the car of the Juggernaut. The 
Mohammedan has it, when he pursues with 
fire and sword, those whom he wishes to con- 
vert to his faith. The Christian has it, when 
he conforms to a known law of a superior 
order. 

I do not by any means affirm, that he who 
hangs on hooks fastened through his side, or 
compels his neighbor by fire or sword, to 



CONSCIENTIOUSNESS 153 

embrace his religion, acts up to the dignity of 
even his lower conscience. All I affirm is that 
he has his conscientiousness. But if this be so, 
what then do you mean, I shall be asked, when 
you complain of a want of conscientiousness 
in the world, and speak of the case as an ur- 
gent one ? The want of which I complain is 
a comparative one. Our standard of right and 
wrong, in this enlightened age and country, is 
very high ; and therefore, to whom much is 
given, of the same will much be required. 

It is not a few religious duties, or a few 
important relations, merely, in regard to which 
we are to be conscientious. It is not on occa- 
sions, or set times, or particular seasons alone, 
but on all occasions, times and seasons. What- 
ever is worth doing is worth doing well, says 
an old and very true saying. And a higher 
authority than any other has enjoined upon us : 
" Whether ye eat or drink, or whatever ye do, 
do all to the glory of God." 

But if whatever we do is to be done right — 
to the glory of God — then it should be done 
conscientiously. And we have no more right 
to set aside conscience in one case than in 



154 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

another. Not that all laws, moral, religious, 
and secular, are of equal authority, so as to 
make the voice of conscience equally loud. 
Still her decisions concerning the smallest 
matters, when they have been made — and 
made they should continually be — are as truly 
binding as those which relate to matters of the 
first magnitude. 

A young man in Boston — a teacher — with 
whom I had the pleasure of a long and valua- 
ble acquaintance, was one day conversing on 
the subject to which I have now called your 
attention, when he suddenly observed : " Why, 
my dear sir, there is a large range of human 
action that has no right or wrong about it." 

I have seldom been more struck with sur- 
prise, in my whole life, than with this singular 
answer, especially as coming from an intelligent 
and good man. Had he read Paul ? I thought. 
And accordingly, I asked him if he had not. 
" Oh, yes," he said ; " but this saying of Paul, 
in this particular, must be understood with some 
limitation. He cannot mean that there is a 
right and wrong to every small concern of 
human life. The matter of gratifying the 



CONSCIENTIOUSNESS. 155 

appetite must be one of these. Why, we are 
creatures of instinct, in many things ; and our 
actions are matters of instinct, with which 
right and wrong have nothing to do." 

It is hardly necessary for me to say to you 
that this reasoning was at war with facts — 
the Bible itself being competent testimony. 
And yet it is — practically so, at least — the rea- 
soning of thousands. But men ought to 
know better than to have doubts on such a 
subject about which the Bible is so explicit. 

1 must maintain, moreover, that it is accord- 
ing to right reason to suppose that we should 
be conscientious in these matters. Why, there 
must be right and wrong and conscience 
somewhere, all admit — but where ? Is it in 
regard to larger matters alone ? Why, these 
but seldom recur, whereas the smaller matters 
of life are of almost perpetual recurrence. 

Or if it should be still urged that there are 
certain small matters, which are so very small 
that they have no moral character to them, 
will any one point out the precise line or de- 
gree at which they commence ? In the de- 
scending scale, for example, which is the last 



156 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

of the series of matters so large as to have 
character to it, and which the first so trifling 
as to have no character ? 

For until some one will do this, I shall 
deem it my duty to maintain that there neither 
is nor can be any dividing line. And as there 
would be a very great difference, some placing 
the line at one point of elevation, some at 
another, I shall not hold myself obliged to pay 
much attention to any dividing line, till one is 
mentioned in which all or nearly all agree. 
But this is not, in the nature of things, likely 
to happen. 

I do not suppose mankind deem it their duty 
to be conscientious for more than one-eighth or 
one-tenth of their time. Of course, the hours 
for sleep are not included in that tenth. But 
there is only one day in seven, during any 
considerable part of which, the mass of man- 
kind give much heed to the voice of conscience. 
Even on this day, the far greater number have 
no conscience in regard to any thing more than 
a few stated hours. The rest they consider 
themselves as allowed to eat, drink, or sleep 
away, as they may choose. 



CONSCIENTIOUSNESS. 157 

And as for the six week days, the heavenly 
monitor seems to have nothing to do on these, 
except to prompt us on a few occasions as at 
morning and evening devotions — at stated 
meals — and in times of sickness, adversity, or 
dissolution. Or if he comes in the still small 
voice, we silence it amid the din of business or 
the hurry of amusement. 

Strange that it should be so. Well might a 
venerable ancient, who was looking over the 
volume of inspiration, and thinking of its 
demands, cry out, Blessed Lord, either these 
are not thy words, or we are not Christians ! 
Blessed Lord, I will add, in relation to our 
present subject, either the volume of Truth is 
not thine, and reason is not thine, and we are 
not thy children, or else we fall far short — I 
might almost say infinitely short of the stand- 
ard of conscientiousness, thou hast thyself 
established. Send down upon us then, thy 
heavenly wisdom, that we may amend our 
lives, and spend the remainder of them ac- 
cording to thy most reasonable and most divine 
will and word. 



LETTER XIX. 

LOVE OF EXCITEMENT 

Few topics could be selected of greater im- 
portance to the young, than that which is 
intended by the caption of this article. And 
if I should fail to make it appear so, let the 
blame fall on me — rather on my manner of 
handling the subject — and not on the subject 
itself which I have chosen. 

When I speak of the evils of excitement, 
however, I usually mean an undue or exces- 
sive love of it. To avoid excitement wholly, 
would be to go out of the world — and perhaps 
out of the universe. Air and water, in a sense, 
are excitants, although it is true that without 
them we could not survive a moment. But 
there is a wide difference between excitement 



LOVE OF EXCITEMENT. 159 

and over-excitement — or in other words, be- 
tween a reasonable use of excitement, and 
excess in its use — induced by an undue fond- 
ness or love of it. Stimulus, stimulus ! ex- 
citement, excitement ! this is the universal cry. 

This is an evil which prevails every where, 
and in almost every form. Nay, more ; this 
undue fondness for excitement of body or 
mind, is not only every where prevalent, but 
every where increasing; and threatens, un- 
heeded and unopposed, the ruin of the whole 
rising generation. Against it, therefore, I feel 
compelled to lift up a warning voice. Let him 
hear who hath ears. 

Some there are who meet us at the thres- 
hold, by what they suppose to be an insur- 
mountable difficulty, and gravely tell us that 
no line can be drawn between that amount, or 
degree, or kind of stimulus which is healthful, 
and that which is unhealthful or injurious. 
But this is a mistake. Excitants or stimuli, 
cease to be healthful or salutary in their effects, 
precisely when and where they cease to invi- 
gorate body or mind, and when their effects 
begin to prove debilitating. 



160 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

What, it will be asked, is the rule, then ? Is 
it to make one's own experience his guide ? I 
answer, yes ; as far as our own experience goes. 
This, however — the experience of any one 
individual, I mean — will go but a little way. 
Much will remain — very much — to be deter- 
mined by the experience of others, and espe- 
cially by those forms of experience which are 
embodied into science. 

To make plain my meaning, take the case 
of alcoholic drinks. Now, there is a use of 
these drinks, whose consequences in their 
direct effects on himself, no young man could 
mistake. The greatest ignoramus I have ever 
seen intoxicated, knew he had been too far — 
had indulged his love of excitement to excess 
— when fairly recovered to his former condi- 
tion. The prodigal in the gospel understood 
perfectly well where he had been, when he 
" came to himself.' 7 And yet there are other 
uses of alcoholic drink, which, judging merely 
from one's own experience, produce no evil 
effects, but concerning which, science has told 
us, within a few years, a very different story. 

Experience on a large scale, embodied into 



LOVE OF EXCITEMENT. 161 

science — the sciences of chemistry, physiology, 
&c. — has told us that alcohol in every form 
and in every degree, when introduced into the 
healthy, living, human system, is a foe, and a 
foe continually, until it is expelled. And more 
than this has it told us — that its effects are 
permanent, and even transmissible to other 
and unborn generations. That though the 
use of a moderate quantity of wine, cider, beer, 
or diluted spirits, gives warmth and strength, 
and activity at the time, yet it weakens body 
and mind both, in the end. 

I do not deny that one's own experience, 
enlightened by the study of the sciences, would 
go very far towards enabling us to judge cor- 
rectly on this subject. Indeed, this is what 
has just now been affirmed. As a student of 
chemistry and physiology, I know well, while 
under the influence of half a gill of toddy, a 
gill of wine, or a tumbler of beer or ale, that I 
have gone too far. I know it by a debility of 
the heart and arteries. 

For what if these beat a little faster than 
usual? This does not indicate an increase, 
but a diminution of strength and vigor. The 



162 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

pulse in a fever, though more frequent than 
before, is not the stronger, but the weaker for 
it. And when we drink alcohol, in any shape 
whatever, the arterial action is quickened 
by it. 

And here, by the way, I lay down one gen- 
eral rule, by means of which most persons 
may know when they have, and when they 
have not, passed the line of healthy excite- 
ment. I will not say that the rule admits of 
no exceptions, for like most general rules, it 
may admit a few. The rule is this. As that 
which strengthens does not increase the activ- 
ity of the heart and arteries, but on the con- 
trary causes them to beat more full and strong, 
so that which weakens or debilitates, does in- 
crease this activity, and should therefore be 
avoided. 

Or if there seem one glaring exception to 
this rule, staring us full in the face — I allude 
to the effects of exercise — the rule may be 
modified a little. Whatever so increases the 
activity and strength of the pulse, as to be fol- 
lowed by a debility which, when the system 



LOVE OF EXCITEMENT. 163 

is restored to its balance is not fully removed, 
must be hurtful. 

Need I say here, that all alcoholic drinks — 
down to the weakest home-brewed beer, if it 
has fermented at all — are of this description l 
That tobacco is another ; opium another ; 
coffee another ; tea another, &c ? Every sen- 
sible young man who has used any of these, 
knows that they exhilarate him ; yet he knows, 
too, that after having used them once, if he do 
not repeat his dose, he is ere long debilitated 
as the consequence of their use. 

There is one law which deserves to be better 
known to the young than it sometimes is. 
The smaller the amount of alcohol or stimu- 
lus which is taken into the system — provided 
it is enough to be at all appreciable — the 
greater the derangement, if not the debility 
which follows, in proportion to its quantity. 

Understand me, however, my young friends. 
I do not mean to say, or to intimate, that half 
a gill of small beer, or weak wine, will injure 
you, as much as the same quantity of full 
proof rum, gin, or brandy; but only much 



164 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

more in proportion to the quantity of alcohol 
it contains. 

To some, I am well aware, there will be 
nothing new in this last statement. To a few, 
however, the doctrine will be strange ; and 
they will be disposed to ask, " How can these 
things be ? How is it possible that a smaller 
dose of poison — for poison we take it to be — can 
affect the living system more injuriously, in 
proportion to its quantity, than a large one ? 
Are beer, cider, wine, coffee and tea, more in- 
jurious, then, in proportion to the amount of 
poisonous or medicinal substance they contain, 
than rum, gin and brandy T I answer, that 
they are so. 

Do you wish for reasons ? First, it must be 
so, from the nature of the case. The larger 
the quantity of poison we take, provided we 
do not take enough to overwhelm the powers 
of life at once, the greater the probability that 
there will be a reaction, and that the offending 
substance will be thrown out of the system, 
either upward or downward. Whereas in the 
case of the very small quantity, the system is 
not so much disturbed ; and the little which is 



LOVE OF EXCITEMENT. 165 

tkaen steals its march, as it were, upon the 
system; and becoming incorporated into it, 
has its full pernicious effect. 

Secondly, we establish this doctrine — which 
you are pleased to call a new or strange one — 
by analogy. If we wish to produce a merely 
local impression on the system, by some strong 
medicine — say calomel — we throw a pretty 
large dose, perhaps twelve or twenty grains, 
into the stomach. A reaction soon follows, 
and it is thrown off. 

But if, on the contrary, our aim is to pro- 
duce a general impression — in other words, if 
we wish to poison or salivate with it — we give 
half a grain, or a quarter of a grain. And the 
repetition, for a few times only, of these minu- 
ter doses, will bring about the result we desire. 
It is so with alcohol among the rest. For, 
what is alcohol but a medicine, wherever we 
find it? 

I might add a third species of proof on this 
point, were further proof needful. They who 
use alcohol in large measure, once in a month, 
or once in two months, and then use nothing 
but water the rest of the time, though they 



166 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

may, and doubtless do. injure themselves to 
the full extent which has ever, by any finite 
being, been supposed, do not, after all, impair 
their health or diminish their longevity so 
much as those who sip a little every day, and 
yet are never disguised by it. Nor are the ill 
effects on the offspring of the former, so obvious 
as they are on those of the latter. 

Indeed one remark might be applied to all 
medicinal substances, from alcohol, opium, 
calomel and tobacco, down to beer, coffee, tea, 
pepper, saleratus, vinegar, &c. The strength 
they give is not by adding nutriment to the 
system, but by exciting the nerves and brain. 
They give strength, I admit, but it is only by 
tickling the nerves, as it were, and hence the 
strength is temporary, and leaves the system 
more debilitated than it found it. It also in- 
creases the temptation to repeat the dose. 

I wish young men could fully understand 
and appreciate the views I have here faintly 
and imperfectly, but yet in all sincerity and 
honesty set forth. I wish they could fully 
know that all the extra warmth and strength 



LOVE OF EXCITEMENT. 167 

they obtain, by drawing out nervous energy 
any faster than it is naturally drawn out by 
those articles of food and drink which are pro- 
perly converted into blood, to nourish the body, 
are at the future expense of that nervous sys- 
tem and the other machinery which furnish it. 
For, suppose that correct views on this sub- 
ject were to cut off every conscientious young 
man from the use, not only of all exciting — 
i. e., over-exciting — drinks, but also from all 
kinds of medicine,* however small or trifling, 
would they not be gainers by it in the end ? 
Admit that it should be found out, gradually, 
that many of what are called condiments or 
seasonings, were also medicinal substances ; 
and that they were, each in its turn, abandon- 
ed — what then? Who wishes to gratify his 
natural fondness for excitement, at the expense 
of an impaired constitution for himself and his 

* This remark is not intended to apply to the case of those 
who have submitted themselves to the general direction of 
the physician. They, of course, have no safe way but to 
take whatever he orders for them. Even if he orders poison 
they should take it — and this, too, whether in large or small 
quantities. 



16S LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

posterity ? Who does not, on the contrary, 
wish to do right and reap the consequences ? 

But I might go entirely beyond the region 
of selfishness, and appeal to your sense of 
duty to God and man — to God, I mean, and 
the human race. Have you a right to gratify 
yourself — your nervous sensibilities, I mean — 
at the expense of your health, or at the hazard 
of impairing the constitutions of those who 
may come after you ? 



LETTER XX, 

ON PURITY 

" He is a very pure young man," said a friend 
to me, many years ago, concerning a young 
schoolmaster to whom I had just been intro- 
duced, in eastern Connecticut. A very pure 
young man ! I said to myself. What sort of 
a recommendation is this ? — for as a recom- 
mendation it was certainly intended. 

It is not necessary, however, to live in this 
world half a century, in order to learn that 
purity is one of the highest possible recommen- 
dations, in either sex. We may learn it in half 
that time. I am always glad to find a young 
man or a young woman temperate, conscien- 
tious and industrious. But to find one who is 
pure, is still more than all this ; for purity like 



170 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

charity covers a multitude of other transgres- 
sions. 

You need not regard my opinion, on this 
subject, as standing alone. Paley, in his Natural 
Theology, represents purity of character as the 
hinge on which all else turns. And Paul, in his 
writings, especially in his letters to Timothy, 
repeatedly dwells on its importance. And as 
if to sum up every thing in one, he says to the 
latter on a certain occasion, very emphatically, 
" Keep thyself pure." 

Indeed who that has studied the history of 
mankind, as it is in this particular, is at all 
surprised to find the great apostle of the Gen- 
tile world levelling some of his deadliest blows 
as a Christian warrior in this very direction ? 
Who is not shocked at the very detail of the 
gross impurities he is obliged, in the very 
opening of his letter to the Romans, to charge 
on that then comparatively enlightened and 
elevated nation ? 

But if Rome — learned and polite Rome — 
was so bad, how was it with the rest of the 
nations around her? One may be guided 
by something more than conjecture, in this 



PURITY. 171 

matter. The dark catalogue of vices which 
Paul charges upon the inhabitants of Asia 
Minor and Southern Europe is almost always 
headed by one or two — sometimes three or four 
— kinds of impurity. For example ; adultery, 
fornication, uncleanness, and lasciviousness, 
stand in the foregound of the picture of Galatian 
vices ; fornication and uncleanness in that of 
the Ephesians ; fornication, uncleanness, in- 
ordinate affection, and evil concupiscence, in 
that of the Colossians ; fornication and concu- 
piscence in that of the Thessalonians ; and 
fornication in that of the Corinthians. 

The consequences of these evils are fearful, 
even in this world. They are not all, however, 
equally so. As it is in regard to other vices 
that each, if persisted in, has its appropriate 
disease, (drunkenness, for example, its deli- 
rium tremens,) so it is with all these. But I 
need not particularize. All diseases are, so far 
as I can learn, the penalties of transgression ; 
but the penalty falls on some more, on others 
less directly. There are few that seem so much 
like the direct judgments of offended Heaven 
as that which falls upon gross impurity. 



172 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Short of this, however, there is much suffer- 
ing, not only of the individual, but, as in the 
former case, of posterity also. The sins of 
parents, at least in their consequences, are 
visited upon children unto the third and fourth 
generation — probably to the twentieth. Scrof- 
ula, eruptions, gout, and I hardly know how 
many more diseases, are the frequent punish- 
ment of vice, as committed somewhere. A 
modern physiologist tells us that two-thirds of 
the diseases to which our race is liable, have 
their origin in the abuses to which I now refer. 

Few are probably aware — medical men and 
physiologists excepted — to what an extent the 
least infringement of the Divine law, in these 
particulars, militates againt the well-being of 
our race. That the grosser forms of impurity 
are injurious — at least to others ! — some will 
be ready to admit ; though even here not a 
few are skeptical. But that licentiousness in 
every degree — from the more gross outbreak- 
ings, down to the mere thoughts and imagina- 
tions of the heart — more or less injures the 
health of all who indulge in it, is not, I believe, 



PURITY. 173 

generally known ; and is not usually believed 
when it is proclaimed. 

Yet if there be a truth in the wide moral 
world, it is that every licentious action, word 
and thought — every one, I mean, which is 
truly of the licentious kind — as certainly in- 
jures the physical frame of him who indulges 
it, at least in some small degree, as the foun- 
tain, rivulet, and river lead to the mighty 
ocean ! 

But this is not all, nor the worst. The 
Scriptures of the Old and New Testament 
represent the human being — the body of course 
included — as the temple of the Holy Spirit; 
and while they accompany their exhortations 
to purity with proffers of the richest rewards, 
they also threaten, with the most fearful pen- 
alty, every profanation of that temple. Shall 
we experience the dreadful penalties annexed 
to impurity in this life, when we know, full 
well, that those penalties, dreadful as they may 
be to the sufferer, are but a prelude to suffering 
still greater, in that world of woe to which we 
are rapidly hastening ? 



174 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

That he has no trifling task to perform who 
would keep himself pure, is cheerfully admit- 
ted ; nevertheless he cannot fail of having a 
full reward for his exertion even in this world. 
The consciousness of having in us a spirit of 
purity, is a powerful stimulus to every kind 
of activity. Whereas, the consciousness of 
impurity, makes us feel meanly ; and unfits 
us, in a good degree, for the discharge of every 
duty. 

" Blessed are the pure in heart," said our 
Saviour, and nothing could have been more 
timely or true. He did not say, Blessed will be 
the pure in heart. The blessing is immediate 
and future both. Purity has the promise, like 
godliness, both of this life, and that which is 
to come. 

/ The sources of licentiousness in a world like 
our own, are almost endless. The mighty 
Mississippi does not burst forth a Mississippi 
at once. It is fed by the fountains and streams 
of a million of square miles. So with vice, 
especially that which we are now considering. 

Let me notice, briefly, some of the sources 
of impurity which are most obvious and 



PURITY. 175 

frequent, and against which, therefore, you 
will do well to guard ; and not only to guard 
yourselves, but if it be more needful, your 
neighbors. 

One is too much heat. This may be ap- 
plied either externally or internally. Exter- 
nally, as by too high a temperature in our 
rooms, too much clothing by night or by day, 
and atmospheric excitement acting upon the 
skin. But these last act also on the lungs, 
and therefore lead us to the consideration of 
'internal sources of extra heat. These are an 
exciting or medicated atmosphere, exciting 
food and drink, useless medicine, exciting 
mental food, and excited feelings. 

Against all these, and perhaps many others, 

every young man will do well to be on his 

guard, and that continually. Some of them 

i 
are, of course, worse than others ; but all are 

quite bad enough. No one of them can be 
long in operation, with safety ; but the influ- 
ence of two or three of them combined is, of 
course, much worse than that of any one act- 
ing singly. In general, let your motto be, 
Keep cool, keep cool. 



176 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Another source of impurity is undue men- 
tal excitement. One effect of excessive 
mental excitement may be to produce internal 
heat upon the brain. Those who excite their 
brains too much, are often such as sit a good 
deal ; which doubtless increases the determin- 
ation of blood to the head ; and is accompanied 
with the development of an unusual amount 
of heat. But apart from the ill effects of the 
heat, there seems to be a reflex action, when- 
ever we drive the brain too fast, which has a 
direct tendency to excite impure thoughts and 
feelings, and, in various ways, to do much 
mischief. 

For reasons, however, upon which I have 
not now room or disposition to enter, it would 
appear that the perusal of works of imagina- 
tion and fiction, have a more obvious, certain, 
and immediate tendency to licentious feelings, 
than works of a graver sort, and the pursuit of 
mathematics, and other grave studies. 

Another fruitful source of the evil in ques- 
tion, is indulgence itself. As face, in the glass, 
answers to face, and as like, by a general, if 



PURITY. 177 

not inevitable law of Nature's God, produces 
its like, so every degree and form of impurity, 
in thought, word, and deed, tends to increase 
the maddening flame, and endanger our de- 
struction. 

Young men do not seem to understand this. 
Not a few of them seem to suppose, that just 
as the newly formed gas in the fermenting 
cask will sometimes, for want of vent, burst 
forth with such violence as to destroy the cask, 
and scatter abroad its contents, so if there be 
no such thing as giving vent to the appetites, 
the system must Suffer. They suppose, in one 
word, there must be an explosion ; and that 
this explosion, like those of Etna and Vesu- 
vius, serves the system an important purpose. 

Such young men ought, however, to know 
that, before the age of twenty-five, if not 
afterward, every improper action, word, and 
thought, is like seed cast into a luxuriant soil, 
and brings forth a new crop of the same kind. 
The greater the indulgence, the louder the cry 
of the system for its repetition. It is, in this 
respect, like the horse leech's daughter men- 



178 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

tloned by Solomon, that cried incessantly, 
Give, give. 

I have said " before the age of twenty-five," 
because prior to this period, no young man has 
any thing to do — in virtue of the laws of phy- 
siology — with any of the forms of indulgence 
to which I refer, unless he is willing to inflict 
an injury on his whole system, physical and 
mental, from which he can never fully recover. 
Indulgence, after this period, is fruitful enough 
of evil consequences, but it is much more so 
before it. 

At present I will only add, that one common 
and prolific source of improper and impure 
feelings is bad associates — whether of one sex 
or the other. These are very common, and 
very influential. Who does not know that 
example is almost omnipotent? Yet that same 
example is as powerful for evil as for good — 
perhaps more powerful. It is so, if the general 
tendencies of human nature are downward, 
rather than upward. It is so, if the public 
opinion concerning men, in all ages, has been 
true. It is so, if the testimony of Revelation, 



PURITY. 179 



corroborating that of reason and public opinion, 
has any weight. It is so, if the promises of 
God hare any thing to invite us, or his threat- 
en ings any thing to excite our terror. 



LETTER XXL 

MODELS AND MODEL CHARACTER. 

In my letter on politics. I shall urge upon you 
the study of the history and geography of our 
country, as the basis of that subject, Closely 
connected with these, however, is the study of 
biography. I wish this last were made a 
fundamental branch in every public or com- 
mon school. For to say nothing, now. of the 
historical and political information which, 
when properly written, it communicates, it is 
still more valuable, in another respect, to which 
I would respectfully call your attention. 

Young men. to an extent greater or less, are 
chameleon-like. They take a tinge, so to 
speak, from the company they keep : especially 
if it is much kept: Nay,, they are often affected 



MODELS MODEL CHARACTER. 181 

for life by the society of an individual for 
merely half an hour. It is so as regards com- 
ing in contact with character through the 
medium of books. 

Now, biography enables us to associate (to 
all practical interests and purposes) with men 
of all ages and all climes — with Moses, Joseph, 
David, Solomon, Isaiah, Homer, Confucius, 
Plato, Zeno, Paul, John, Franklin, Cuvier, 
and Howard. In the language of another, we 
are enabled, in this way, to "shake hands 
across oceans and centuries." And young 
men are often influenced almost as much by 
the men of other climes and ages with whom 
they thus shake hands, as by those whose 
hands they shake, from day to day, at home. 

I knew a 3^oung man who was fond, to ex- 
cess, of the writings of Franklin. Not only 
his philosophy, but his manners, habits, and 
style of writing charmed him, and at once 
became his model. The attachment to the 
Doctor led, in a practical point of view, to an 
intimate acquaintance. His efforts to imitate 
him were attended with great success. He 
became a " doer of good f and learned, with 



182 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Franklin, to value highest, this species of re- 
putation. 

Others have taken, as their model, such men 
as Addison, Washington, or Byron. The re^ 
suit has been, in not a few instances, that they 
have approximated to the character they have 
labored to imitate. And Franklin, himself, in 
point of style, was a successful imitator of 
Addison. 

No young man can know how much he is 
indebted to this species of influence. If the 
notion of Dr. Rush, that we are apt to re- 
semble those by whose names we are called, 
especially when they have been greatly dis- 
tinguished, is well founded, may it not be 
accounted for from the fact, that we are led, 
by the name, to become familiar with the 
biography of him who bore it ; and thus in a 
degree to take him as a model ? 

Let me exhort every young man to select 
his model, and do it early in life. The earlier 
the better. I do not, indeed, mean to insist 
upon your copying any one character, exclu- 
sively ; nor in fact upon your attempting a per- 
fect copy of any body. Men are but frag- 



MODELS MODEL CHARACTER. 183 

ments of men, after all ; and do not deserve — 
the best of them — to be copied entire. Even 
the venerable Dr. Franklin himself is not an 
exception to the truth of this remark. 

Perhaps it might be preferable to have be- 
fore the mind's eye, as models, several different 
individuals. One may be our model in point 
of style, another in manners, another in phi- 
losophy, &c. On this last point, however, I 
speak with some diffidence, for want of suffi- 
cient experience. 

Of one thing, however, I am certain ; which 
is, that many excellent young men — I mean 
excellent in point of intention — accomplish but 
little in this world, because they attempt but 
little. The greater part, in truth, come into 
the world and pass through it as if they were 
without any definite aim and object. And as 
certainly as the stream never rises higher than 
the fountain whence it has its source, just so 
certainly will young men who aim at nothing, 
accomplish nothing. 

I do not forget how apt I am to dwell on 
this topic — the low and unworthy aims of a 
great many young men. When you have 



184 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

had the experience of half a century, however, 
you will know how to excuse me. You will 
not only know how to excuse importunity and 
repetition, but also warmth. 

A patient of mine, in one instance, who was 
dragging on an aimless existence, was told 
how to set his mark high, and was actually 
set to work. The result was, in a little while, 
very great improvement in his whole condi- 
tion. 

But I am inclined to digression. I have 
said that men are mere fragments of men — 
and that it is difficult, therefore, to find in any 
individual, a perfect model. There is one 
exception to the truth of this remark. In the 
man of Nazareth, we find a perfect model 
character. Happy the individual, young or 
old, who is wise enough to select his model 
in this divine direction. 

Let no young man sneer at the idea of fixing 
on Jesus Christ as his model. Let him not 
say that men and manners in 1849, and in 
America, differ so greatly from the men and 
manners of Palestine in the days of our Sa- 
viour, that such a model is no model at all ; 



MODELS MODEL CHARACTER. 185 

for it is not so. No man shall go before me 
in estimating the value of a Saviour for the 
" atonement's sake f and yet no man shall go 
before me in valuing him as our exemplar. 
The Saviour was a model for the child, the 
youth, and the young man, no less than for 
the man of thirty. 

True it is, we do not know that he was ever 
tried in all the circumstances of every young 
man's life ; but only in all the essential points 
which are necessary to develope character. 
And as it seems to me, no young man can 
carefully study his character in all the points 
to which I refer, without understanding what 
is required in order to follow him. 

Let Jesus Christ, then, my young friends, 
be your model man. Study, above all the 
rest, his biography. Find out, as soon as 
possible, what it is to act as he acted ; and 
what he would do, governed by the great 
principles by which it is clearly seen he was 
governed, in all your circumstances. Find it 
out, I say, but do more. Yield yourselves up 
to be led by him. Were young men to do 
this, but for a single century, the world would 



186 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

again flourish as did Eden — nay, it would 
become as the garden of God. 

If you call this preaching, be it so. How 
shall young men, any more than old men, 
" hear without a preacher V You are fond of 
philosophy, I suppose — common sense philo- 
sophy. Now philosophy has had much to 
say, during the last century, about the influ- 
ence of example. But who has not conceded 
that our Saviour's example may safely be im- 
itated ? Be philosophers, for once, and let the 
brightest example the world has yet seen, be 
more powerful with you than even his divine 
precepts. 



LETTER XXII. 

DECISION AND FIRMNESS. 

The eminent John Foster has written a long 
essay upon the importance of Decision ; and 
this essay of his has contributed more, per- 
haps, than all things else which he has written, 
to bring him into favorable notice. Indeed, had 
he written nothing else, this alone would have 
" immortalized " his name. 

" Decision of character," says Mudie, on the 
observation of nature, "consists in the readi- 
ness and rapidity with which we can not only 
judge, but judge rightly. When genuine," 
he adds, "and exercised within the proper 
bounds, it is probably the most valuable tem- 
perament of mind that man can possess." No 
wonder, then, if in a series of letters to young 
men, I call attention to it, for a few moments. 



188 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

It stands opposed, we are told, to that inde- 
cision which disqualifies a man for weighing 
evidence, and that fastidiousness in which 
time and attention are wasted upon trifles 
which form no important part of the evidence 
at all. 

" Napoleon Bonaparte is perhaps," adds Mu- 
die, " the most remarkable instance of decision 
of character, that occurs in well authenticated 
history;" and I have no doubt he was so. 
And yet, as the same excellent writer well 
observes, his history affords the most remark- 
able instance on record of the failure of that 
decision. 

Ledyard, the American traveller, is usually 
set down as more remarkable than most men 
for decision of character. Perhaps Washing- 
ton has as few superiors in this respect as 
any American, except Ledyard and President 
Jackson. And even these last were tempered 
a little too much with the excess of that other 
quality which I have taken for my motto, but 
which it is extremely difficult to blend with 
any thing else in just proportion. 

"A genuine decided character — one which 



DECISION AND FIRMNESS. 189 

will enable a man to carry all his plans into 
effect with success, and to ride buoyant upon 
every wave of the sea of trouble — is perhaps 
not to be obtained, at least early in life, 
without a certain degree of stubbornness ; and 
as that stubbornness produces a sort of con- 
tempt for advice and new information, even in 
the case in which their aid would be most de- 
sirable, there is some danger of failure and 
reverse after success has lulled caution, and 
time begun to blunt the edge of observation. 

" The man of truly decided character, must 
be one who is capable of taking long and 
clear views into the future ; but as the past is 
the only telescope through which the future 
can be seen, the man of truly decided char- 
acter must be an incessant, and also a silent 
observer from his youth." 

To me it seems that little can be accom- 
plished in this world, without decision and 
firmness both. And yet the great desidera- 
tum, during the whole work of self-education, 
consists in so tempering these together, that 
they may both accomplish their purposes with- 
out the excesses which have sometimes been 



190 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

charged against them, and to which it cannot 
well be denied they are liable. 

If this book, and about a hundred others, 
from the same author, have been of any value 
to the world, it is owing, in no small degree, to 
a certain turn of life which might be named, 
and that turn was the result of decision of 
character. 



LETTER XXIIL 

SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 

Since the Young Man's Guide was first writ- 
ten, one or two eminent men have most earn- 
estly requested me to review the ground of an 
opinion expressed in that work, viz. : that 
young men are apt to assume the full respon- 
sibilities of business too early. I have done 
so ; still, however, I am driven to the same 
conclusion as before. 

The notion is prevalent among young men 
— it always has been so — that each new gene- 
ration, especially their own, is wiser than that 
which preceded it. So that though most of 
you are well aware that your ancestors began 
business later than you, yet you seem to see 



192 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

in this, no reason why you should wait till you 
reach the same more advanced age. You 
honestly believe, no doubt, that you are as 
capable of succeeding at twenty or twenty-two, 
as they were at twenty-five or twenty-eight. 

In most of the cities of the United States, 
young men set up for themselves in business 
by the time they are twenty-one ; and not a 
few even earlier. And a majority of those 
now engaged in business— the active part of 
business I mean — are between twenty and 
thirty-five ; perhaps I might even say between 
twenty and thirty. It is so in particular in 
New- York. 

Now it was not always so. Men set up in 
business much earlier than formerly. For- 
merly, too, success was more certain than now. 
There were failures then, I well know ; but 
they were not so frequent or so common. It 
could not be said then, as it now is, that 
ninety-five in a hundred of all our mercantile 
men fail once at least in their business life- 
time, or that there are few men who succeed 
in business who have not made at least one 
failure. 



SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 193 

Now who shall say that a state of things 
where failure in business is almost universal ; 
and success, without a failure, only an excep- 
tion to the general rule, is not owing, in a very 
large degree, to the fact that the young rush 
into business too early ? Yet since so many 
do say this, let us review the grounds of such 
an opinion. Let us see who, in this particular, 
are the wisest, we or our fathers. 

Professional men, beyond a doubt, often fail 
of success because they assume the responsi- 
bilities of their profession too early. Even if 
they set out with sound constitutions, they 
very often destroy themselves by the age of 
thirty-five ; or at least render themselves use- 
less if not burdensome. But when they often 
set out, as is a matter of fact, with scrofulous 
or consumptive constitutions, this increases the 
evil, both as regards tendencies and results. 

These remarks are particularly applicable to 
young clergymen, but will serve for the "lati- 
tude and longitude of young men of other 
professions. The physician, as a general fact, 
sets up for himself a little later, and perhaps 
also the lawyer. But the teacher breaks down 
9 



194 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

almost as early as the clergyman ; and for 
nearly the very same reasons. I have known 
but one teacher who lasted to be useful in his 
profession fifty years f and he began his 
studies late — I believe at about twenty-five 
years of age. 

Pres. Humphrey, late of Amherst College, 
appears to be of opinion that young men ought 
not to assume the full responsibilities of 
preacher and pastor till about thirty years of 
age. Other wise men entertain a similar 
opinion. And you know the Jewish rule — a 
rule to which it would seem our Saviour chose 
to conform. He did not enter upon the full 
responsibilities of his mission till he was over 
twenty-nine — that is till he " began to be about 
thirty." 

I am not disposed to attach too much impor- 
tance to this particular period ; but no man is 
a man, in the full sense of the term, till he is 
well nigh thirty. The bony frame is not fully 
consolidated till about twenty-five; and in 
some cases not till twenty-seven or twenty-eight. 
Then again the mental framework, so to call 
it, is of still slower growth. And once more ; 



SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 195 

the scrofulous are still longer in coming to 
maturity, or at least in becoming able to bear 
an average share of earth's responsibilities, 
than most other people. 

Those who fall into mercantile pursuits— 
and of the readers of these remarks, not a few 
are supposed to be of this description — are 
little wiser in their course than those who be- 
take themselves to the learned professions. 
They set out almost as unfavorably, rush 
forward as eagerly, and break down as early. 
Bright as their morning is — for scrofula is re- 
markable for the brightness it imparts — their 
sun sets ere they are aware, often before noon. 

How have I been pained a thousand times, 
to see these buds of promise so early perish ! 
The remark on infancy, — a Too bright to live 
long," and that on youth and adolescence, — 
" Death delights in a shining mark," mean 
something. They point to scrofula, " almost 
as sure as plummets fall." This prematurity 
— precocity rather — in body and mind, that 
delight us so much, are of ill portent. Give 
me the slower growth, and duller mental 
powers, in preference. I want no precocity — 



196 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

no prematurity — no prodigies. I want no 
plants — human ones, at least — for hot-houses. 

Young I- was son of a clergyman of 

eminence, some twenty miles or more from 
Boston. He was a bud of promise, and un- 
happily was thought fit for the city counting- 
room, when his constitution required the air 
and exercise of his father's little farm. At 
sixteen he was a clerk in Washington-street. 
Scarcely out of his teens, his ambition was 
gratified with the full responsibilities of busi- 
ness. And what he could not do, towards 
destroying himself, during the six days, he 
made up, on the seventh, with Sabbath school. 
He died suddenly, and was buried with all 
the honors which are usually awarded, in 
these cases, by the ignorant and unthinking. 
Mysterious, it was said, by good men even, 
are the ways of Providence ; and this, with a 
sigh, was all ; except that they went on their 
way to train their sons to run the same race. 

I will not deny — for I cannot conscientious- 
ly do so — that not a few of these precocious 
young men, will "make more money," were 



SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 197 

making money the great end and aim of life, 
by ten years of active effort between twenty 
and thirty, than by any ten years after that 
period. But grant even that a young man 
may "make his fortune " in that time, and then 
lay aside business, and live on his hastened 
earnings, still it does not follow that he has 
taken the wiser course. 

If there were any method of ascertaining 
the exact yearly loss to society in consequence 
of acute disease — rendered severe and fatal by 
over-exertion of body and mind, amid a mul- 
tiplicity of cares, many of which belong not 
at all to such early years — we should proba- 
bly be astonished at the fearful aggregate. 

Should it fall as low as thousands — I fear 
rather that it would rise to tens of thousands 
— the results would startle us. Place the 
number at 10,000, the average age at death at 
twenty-five ; the average duration of human 
life at forty-five, and the value of time at only 
$ 250 a year ; and yet we have an annual loss,, 
in this respect, of $50,000,000. Will any 
of you say this is an over-estimate ? I wish 
it might prove so. 



198 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

But leaving this class, there is another which 
is little less to be pitied— I mean dyspeptics. 
Fewer young men become dyspeptics who 
engage in mercantile pursuits — I mean fewer 
in proportion to the whole number concerned 
— than of those who engage in sedentary oc- 
cupations, such as shoemaking, tailoring, &>c. 
And yet there are many merchants, and mer- 
chants' clerks, who suffer in this way. I sup- 
pose about 5000 of these last become dyspeptics 
every year. 

These lose, (saying nothing of the bodily 
suffering, which some think worse than death,) 
at least half their time, for a period as long 
as the former. Here is an aggregate of 
$25,000,000. 

But I have not yet done. We lose every 
year about 60,000 young people from con- 
sumption and scrofula. They are almost 
always precocious, and have been hurried into 
active life too soon. I suppose I am quite safe 
in placing the number of young men whose 
dissolution by consumption is hastened in this 
way, at 20,000 a year. Indeed, I am afraid 
this is much too low. 



SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 199 

These die at an average age of thirty. 
They therefore lose fifteen years each ; besides 
an average of two years from sickness. Here 
is an aggregate of $95,000,000. Put together 
the three smaller aggregates I have made out, 
and we have a grand total of $170,000,000. 
Remember, moreover, that this loss is to be 
repeated, in the usual course of things, every 
year ! 

Now I ask the friends of going early into 
business, whether they really believe that 
society gains enough by it to compensate it- 
self for all this loss. It will require a good 
many purchases and sales to clear $170,000,- 
000 a year, or more than $5,000,000,000 every 
thirty years ! 

I have not taken into the account the medi- 
cine, and a thousand other things which I 
might have reckoned, because I would not 
seem to be extravagant. I will just add, how- 
ever, that the value of the medical services and 
medicine these persons consume yearly, must 
rise above one million of dollars — while the 
loss of time to attendants and friends cannot 
be less than several millions. 



200 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

They who complain of the doctrines of the 
1 Young Man's Guide/' should know what is 
the end — the dreadful end — of this rushing 
so early into business. They should know 
how many fail in business, as the consequence, 
and how many in health. They should make 
wise comparisons between those who serve 
a long apprenticeship to their employment — 
whether learned, mercantile, mechanical or 
manufacturing — and those who do not. 

And this it is — precisely this very thing — 
this apprenticeship — that I am about to re- 
commend to you, my young friends. I know 
you are apt to revolt from it ; but depend upon 
it, mere feeling, in this as well as in other 
matters, is blind. The intellect is the helms- 
man, and blind feeling must yield to her the 
pre-eminence. 

I do not say you must serve, in every in- 
stance, seven, or ten, or twelve years. Circum- 
stances may require a longer period in one 
case than in another. But be you sure of one 
thing — the longer you can serve in this way, 
provided you are this side of thirty, and are 
conscious you are every day growing wiser, 



SETTING UP IN BUSINESS. 201 

healthier and holier, the better for all your 
prospects will it be, whether near or remote. 

Even if your highest aim were to make 
money, what I have said is worthy of your 
entire confidence. I have been young, and 
now am old, yet never have I seen the young 
man a loser even in a pecuniary point of vieAV, 
from serving many long years as an apprentice 
or a journeyman. 

Grant, as we have already done, that youth 
is more active — and that a young man will 
do more between twenty and forty, than be- 
tween thirty and fifty ; yet if, on the one hand, 
he is dead or as good as dead at forty, and on 
the other, able to go through with a second 
twenty years of hard labor, is he the loser ? 
And this comparison has facts for its basis. It 
is far from being an exaggeration. 

Perhaps I need not recur to my own ex- 
perience in proof of the correctness of the 
views I present; but you must allow me to 
say, in this place, that so far as the experience 
of a single individual can go towards estab- 
lishing a point of this kind, mine is in favor 
of a long joimieymanship. After I was more 
9* 



202 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

than 28 years of age, I rode, as it is termed, 
with another physician, for some time, before 
I entered upon the full responsibilities and 
duties of the medical profession, and I assure 
you, that to this hour, I have never for one 
moment regretted it. 



LETTER XXIV. 

MONEY GETTING. 

In a community like our own, where the road 
to wealth, like the road to market, lies open 
to all ; where every one, for aught which can 
be foreseen, may become a Girard or an Astor, 
it is not strange that the love of money should 
be a predominating trait or element of human 
character ; and of the character of young men 
as well as old. For young men are older men 
in miniature, and soon learn to copy them in 
their employments, habits, virtues, and vices. 

Nor is it strange, that in denouncing the 
love of money as the root of all evil, many 
worthy individuals should be found, who pass 
to the extreme of inculcating — what, indeed, 
they may not themselves always practise — an 
utter disregard of property. Nay, it is not 



204 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

strange, even, if a few should hold forth, espe- 
cially to the young, that money is not only to 
be neglected, but despised. 

Now it happens that truth in this matter, as 
in many others, lies somewhere between ex- 
tremes. To the old and the young, as a 
means to an end, or rather as an instrument 
to an end, money has its value. In truth, 
there are not a few Christians so low in the 
scale of moral progress, as not to know that 
there is a higher or more laudable means of se- 
curing the ends they seek, than getting money. 
They may outgrow this ignorance by and by ; 
if Christians, indeed, they will outgrow it. 
But to say to them as they now are, that the 
pursuit of wealth, in every degree, and in all 
circumstances, is morally wrong, would be not 
merely to check their upward progress, but to 
put an end to it. 

Nature, in the material world, abhors a va- 
cuum; and so of human nature. To take 
away the pursuit of property, or even the love 
of it, entirely, and at once, would be to take 
from some men all motive to exertion ; and to 
make their minds and hearts a vacuum. 



MONEY-GETTING. 205 

This is not to deny the general truth of the 
Scriptures, nor to raise the slightest doubt in 
regard to their statements on this subject. The 
love of pleasure — another personage of the 
world's trinity— is a root of all kinds of evil, as 
well as the love of money ; and yet who is 
there that would utterly reject it as a motive 
in human action ? 

The truth is, we are to do our duty ; in do- 
ing which, as society is now constituted, mo- 
ney or property will inevitably come. And 
when received, it is to be taken care of as a 
means of doing good. It is blessed to receive ; 
but more blessed to communicate or give. 
Now, such is the usual connection between 
labor and its reward — work and pay — that 
most men come insensibly to confound things 
that may not naturally belong together. Duty 
is the end ; money a means only. Just as it 
is in regard to seeking happiness. 

The great end of human exertion should be 
holiness. Nevertheless, the general arrange- 
ment of things being such that holiness se- 
cures happiness, we come to confound them, 
or to seek both, the latter as well as the for- 



206 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

mer ; and sometimes the latter, chiefly, with- 
out thinking of the former. Here and every- 
where, let us do our duty and take the conse- 
quences. 

Let me not be understood as inclining to the 
opinion of a few eminent men, that the more 
business a man does, and the more money he 
gains in being thorough in his business, the 
better it is even for his spiritual growth. I 
believe it was Dr. Adam Clark who said, in 
relation to this subject : " The more irons you 
have in the fire the better." But this is carry- 
ing the matter too far. 

Nevertheless it is true — and may every 
young man who reads this give heed — that 
God has made you to live in this world, and 
to do business in it. The road to heaven lies 
through earth, and, so far as man is concerned, 
always will. There is, doubtless, such a thing 
as buying and selling, and getting gain in a 
lawful manner. There is such a thing as do- 
ing business, and receiving the avails of doing 
business in such a manner as will please God, 
and in the language of Scripture, glorify him. 
But there is a more excellent way than that 



MONEY-GETTING. 207 

which is commonly pursued, and which has 
given rise to the prejudices against doing busi- 
ness which have often existed in contemplative 
minds. 

What is this more excellent way ? Numer- 
ous answers to the question, in a general way, 
may undoubtedly be given. We may say it is 
to do as we would be done by. Or, we may 
say, it is to look on the things of others, as 
well as on our own. Or, again, that it is to 
regard not solely our own, but also another's 
wealth or welfare. Or, again still, it is to 
glorify God in whatsoever we do. Or, finally, 
it is to have Holiness to the Lord written 
on all we do; our business, of course, not ex- 
cepted. 

Let us, however, be a little more particular. 
A young man has something to sell, for which 
he desires, as lawfully he may, an equivalent 
in money. In such a case, though he is en- 
titled to the full value of the article, yet he 
must never forget the rights of the person to 
whom he sells. He is entitled to the full va- 
lue of his money. 

In buying, also, the seller's rights are to be 



208 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

considered as well as our own. As we are 
entitled to the full value of our money, so he 
is entitled to the value, in full, of his property. 
And we are not only to consider this, but to 
see that he has it. As Christian young men, 
we cannot honestly suffer ourselves to come 
short of this. 

Again, in exchanging property, we are to 
look, every man, on the things and rights of 
others. True, it often happens in buying and 
selling, but especially in exchanging property, 
that both parties may not only have their 
rights, but one party or the other something 
more. 

A and B, for example, have each a house to 
live in ; but the house of B would better ac- 
commodate A than his own does. Or, it may 
be the reverse ; that A's house would better 
accommodate B than- his own. Or, it may be 
that an exchange, while it secures to each all 
his just rights, might also give to each some- 
thing more than the demands of mere justice. 
In other words, it may happen that one party 
may gain something without any loss to the 
other; or, in fewer instances, both may be 



MONEY-GETTING. 209 

gainers, and the exchange may make both of 
them richer. 

My opinion is, that no young man should 
buy, sell, or exchange in such a way that the 
other party will, as a necessary result, be the 
loser, unless by his own consent. Nay, I am 
compelled to go even farther than this — I sup- 
pose we are bound to see that every one with 
whom we deal has his just rights — in other 
words, we must not suffer him even to defraud 
himself if we can help it. 

Now, as to an equal division of the gains 
oyer and above what is required to do strict 
justice to the party with whom we deal-- 
whether, for example, when by receiving A's 
house for mine, I not only get the full value 
of my property, and he the full value of his, 
but there is a gain to me, by reason of peculiar 
circumstances, of five hundred dollars, and to 
him of but two hundred — whether, in such a 
case, I say, I am bound, as a Christian, to 
divide equally with him, each receiving three 
hundred and fifty dollars, or an equivalent for 
the sum, is quite another question. 

There is, however, a higher rule than any I 



210 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

have mentioned — high at least in appearance, 
if not in reality — which is to do what we sup- 
pose our Saviour would do in our circumstances. 
And if this consideration should not enable us 
to decide the question satisfactorily, nothing 
short of this should. 

Here is the grand test for young and old. 
Hear ye this, young men, and be wise. Get 
property ; but get it as the Lord Jesus Christ 
would, if placed in your own circumstances ; 
remembering that to this same divine person- 
age you must ere long render an account, not 
only in the presence of those with whom you 
have dealt, but in the presence of an assembled 
universe. 



LETTER XXV. 

PLEASURE SEEKING. 

All seek happiness ; and why should they 
not ? They see others in full pursuit after it ; 
they are taught — not merely by Pope, but by 
better men than he — that happiness is "our 
being's end and aim." They are even taught 
that virtue itself " consists in doing good for 
the sake of everlasting happiness." 

They have set up a standard so high and so 
holy, that few, if any, have, as yet, come up 
to it. Some have indeed rejected this doctrine 
theoretically. They have talked of disinter- 
estedness. They have made it synonymous 
with the love of the gospel. 

I am not about to discuss the great question 
in theology, whether or not disinterested love 
is our duty. I am not about to oppose even 



212 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

the general pursuit of happiness. Admit, if 
you please, that the great and good — the great, 
I mean whose goodness made them so — had 
respect, in much that they did, to the recom- 
pense of reward, as the Scriptures themselves 
assure us. Admit that no man ought or can 
turn out of doors the inborn love of happiness 
which prevails in and prompts, in a greater or 
less degree, every human breast. But what 
then ? It is one thing to have the love of hap- 
piness influence us in a degree, and quite 
another to suffer it to be the predominating 
rule of our action. 

The young, in particular, I again say, seek 
for pleasure. Who will show us any good ? 
is in practice their constant cry. Self-denial 
— the refusal of present pleasure for a higher 
degree of that which is remote — is to them 
irksome. FeAV can be induced to submit to it. 
And though they suffer from time to time the 
consequences of their short-sightedness, they 
still persist. A distant heaven and a distant 
hell are alike, to them, unmeaning; or, at 
least, unmoving. 

I speak here, however, of those who have 



PLEASURE SEEKING. 213 

not yet passed from the earlier stages of life to 
adolescence. I speak not of him who is six- 
teen, eighteen, or twenty years of age. He 
ought to know better than to make happiness 
his being's end and aim. Granted that the 
great idea held out to him, first at the infant 
school, and afterwards in the family, and 
even the Sabbath school, viz., "Be happy," 
has grown with his growth and strengthened 
with his strength. Still a higher and less self- 
ish system ought by this time to be inculcated. 

Although he should not be taught to despise 
happiness, or even to forget it, every young 
man should be told that in order to fulfil the 
great intention of the Creator, with respect to 
himself, a predominating aim should be to be 
good ; or, in other words, to be holy. 

A venerable minister once said, in the exor- 
dium of his discourse, "The great end of 
Christianity, brethren, is to make men wiser 
and better." He was thought extravagant ; 
but so was the Saviour when he taught his 
ultra doctrines on the Mount and elsewhere. 

The gospel is for the young as well as the 
old — the younger the better. Gospel morality, 



214 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

moreover, should be urged on them, as the only 
true morality — nay, as the only sound morali- 
ty. And no sounder morality can be inculca- 
ted on young men than that which is indicated 
by the injunction, Labor to be good. 

Let this be a predominating motive in all 
your whole life. Let it influence you at going 
out and coming in ; at your employments, 
your studies, your recreations ; at your lying 
down, and at your rising up. But on this 
topic I have spoken at large already. 

If it once becomes a great aim of your life 
to grow wiser and better, you need not longer 
trouble yourselves about happiness. Enough of 
this — quite as much as is best for you — will 
be sure to flow in. 

The Saviour's repeated assurance to the 
good, was, Ye have your reward ; not merely, 
Ye shall have it. Your heaven, if you are 
holy, will begin here ; though it will, of course, 
only begin here. The more holiness, however, 
the more heaven for you here or hereafter. 
Happiness, you thus see, is merely a conse- 
quence — the child, not the parent of holiness. 

But once more. Observe, if you please, that 



PLEASURE SEEKING. 215 

in speaking of the desire to become good, or 
holy, as a predominating motive to action, I 
have said a, not the. For even this is not the 
whole of "our being's end and aim." The 
great end of Christianity is, indeed, to make 
men wiser and better ; but then your great 
end is not alone to make yourself wiser and 
better ; but also to make wiser and better those 
around you. 

The soundness of the first statement of a 
venerable and excellent Christian formulary of 
doctrine — that " man's chief end is to glorify 
God and enjoy him forever " — if applied to man, 
individually, maybe almost questioned ; since 
the enjoyment of the individual himself, as the 
idea has been commonly received, is made 
rather too prominent. It is quite possible that 
future reflection and future progress in Chris- 
tian knowledge and experience, may lead to 
an improvement of the formulary referred to. 
Perhaps it may yet be said (and with more of 
truth) that man's chief end is to glorify God 
by carrying forward, in the highest possible 
degree, the holiness of himself and of his 
fellow-creatures. 



216 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Do you ask what you can do in the way of 
advancing the holiness of mankind — and do 
you say that you are not a missionary, set 
apart to proclaim the gospel to the world ? I 
reply, in the first place, that you have no right 
to move a hand, or foot, or finger, without re- 
garding the good of others. 

In truth you are not able — such is the con- 
dition and constitution of society — to make a 
single movement, which shall not tend either 
to advance or retard the well-being of man- 
kind. 

And, in the second place, if you are not set 
apart in due form to the w^ork of a missionary 
— if you do not actually hear the command 
forever sounding in your ears, u Go into all 
the world, and preach the gospel "— still you 
are as strongly bound to make yourself and 
every body else good to the utmost extent of 
your power, as if it were so. 

I wish I could live to see a generation of 
young men rise up and take the places of their 
fathers, whose constant aim should be to do 
every thing in such a manner as should most 
conduce to public and individual good ; or, in 



PLEASURE SEEKING. 



217 



other words ? to general and individual holi- 



ness. 



The constant aim to do every thing in the 
best possible manner would lead, almost inevi- 
tably, to the full realization of the scriptural 
promise — He that watereth, shall himself also 
be watered ; and to the blessed results alluded 
to by the current maxim, Teaching we learn, 
and giving -we retain. But whether I shall 
live to behold so blessed a period or not, some- 
body will. 

Young men are not apt to care for the good 
or ill effects of their conduct on others. How 
frequently do we hear from mouths the ex- 
pression " I don't care !" For one instance, 
however, in which we have this expression 
put into words, it is ten times thought. And 
yet, this " don't care" spirit, according to the 
celebrated John Foster, is the very essence of 
human depravity. 

Pleasure-seeking, therefore, as such, should 
be given up by every considerate and intel- 
ligent young man ; and he should at once 
change the object of pursuit. To make him- 



218 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

self and every body holy, should be henceforth 
his great purpose. 

In this way, it is true, pleasure would be 
gained — pleasure of the most exalted kind, 
too ; as greatly different from that short-lived 
pleasure with which so mariy of the present 
generation content themselves, as heaven is 
different from hell. I speak here as a philoso- 
pher, and not as a Christian — aware, however, 
that on this point the language of philosophy 
and Christianity is in perfect harmony 

Let him who has a desire to do something 
more in this world than merely to vegetate, — 
to live a life of mere passivity, like the oyster, 
rather — give to this important part of my gen- 
eral subject a full measure of his attention. 
In Scripture language, " He that hath ears to 
hear, let him hear." 



LETTER XXVI. 

MENTAL EXCITANTS. 

As yet, I have said nothing, or almost noth- 
ing, on mental excitants — of which, in every 
form of civic society, great numbers exist. 
Let me call your attention for a few moments, 
to this part of my subject. 

It might almost be affirmed, of a commu- 
nity like our own, without any facts before us, 
other than those which have been presented 
in my letters on temperance, that it is exces- 
sively fond of mental excitants. For, who 
ever saw an individual whose diseased ner- 
vous and digestive systems were constantly 
crying, Give, give, and yet were never satis- 
fied with plain food, whose intellectual and 
moral appetites were not as urgent in their 
demands, and quite as unreasonable ? 



220 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

But, then, we have facts in the greatest 
abundance. What is the character of our 
modern libraries — the best of them? I do 
not allude here, of course, to our circulating 
libraries, as we generally find them in our 
large cities, towns, and thoroughfares ; for these 
are well known to be made up of excitable 
stuff : but, as I remarked before, to the better 
sort of them. How few solid books, indeed, 
are published! How few, in fact, of those 
which possess real worth, are ever read, unless 
highly spiced in some way. 

I have sometimes wished for the moment 
that Boards of Supervision could be estab- 
lished at various points of our wide-spread 
country, whose office it should be to recom- 
mend, if nothing more, such books and such 
alone, as were deemed suitable for town, 
social, district, and private libraries. 

And then again, I have looked with great 
pleasure, and with much of hope, to the col- 
porteur and agent system, as a means of grad- 
ually supplanting the heterogeneous mass of 
books which is every where found, in these 



MENTAL EXCITANTS. 221 

days, by more substantial materials with 
which to build up character. 

However, there is, and ever will be, one 
drawback upon the usefulness of such ar- 
rangements, even were they effected. It is of 
comparatively little use to place good and 
wholesome, but plain food before the young, 
if they cannot be induced to take it. And 
such I fear would be the final fate of good 
books, placed per force^ before those whose 
taste is already vitiated. They would not be 
read ; or if read, they would not be relished. 

I do not forget that • I have spoken to you 
before, on the subject of light reading. But 
there is a worse class of books and papers 
before the young in these days, than light 
ones ; since a book may be light, and yet not 
greatly exciting. Even our newspapers, mag- 
azines and pamphlets might be of a much 
better character in this respect, than some of 
them now are. They might be light, and yet 
healthy. 

A large proportion of our novels, especially 
those published first in our catch-penny papers 



222 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

or magazines, and afterwards thrown out, in 
pamphlet form, in miserable type, upon still 
w r orse paper, and sold cheap, are of the ex- 
citing class. Indeed, they are intended to be 
exciting, just as much as pies and cakes, and 
sweetmeats, and confectionery, are intended 
to be so ! It is because they are so, that they 
obtain so ready a sale. 

I will even venture the assertion, now that 
we are at the place for it, that it is precisely 
to those who have been trained up to pies, 
pastry and confectionery, that these paltry 
productions of a licentious press are particu- 
larly adapted, and that it is they who, in great- 
est numbers, fall victims to their influence. 

I use the word licentious, however, m a 
more general sense, in this place, than is cus- 
tomary. But I might go further and speak of 
the press as being licentious to a very great 
extent, in a more particular and local point of 
view. For is it not strictly true that a very 
large proportion of these publications prove 
exciting because they are licentious ; and that, 
too, in the very worst sense of the word ? I 
know well that their licentiousness may not — 



MENTAL EXCITANTS. 223 

in fact, does not — always appear externally; 
but in this covered, or at least half-concealed 
condition, is it not so much the more dan- 
gerous ? 

There is even a graver class of books than 
those to which I have here alluded, that are 
far too exciting for the healthy mental palate. 
This class is to be found in our bookstores. 
I scarcely know a man who would hesitate to 
keep and sell them, even though he were a 
professed disciple of the Saviour. 

This may seem a very grave charge, but is 
it not founded on the strictest truth? It is 
not asserted, or even intimated, that these 
men who sell the machinery of Satan, ever 
consider well what they are doing. They are 
trained to it — they act as mere machines, or 
almost so. If you say they have no right 
thus to act — they are bound to reflect — my 
reply is, that is your own assertion, and not 
mine. To their own master they stand or 
fall, who deal out to the community, in any 
way or shape, what operates like a fire-brand 
every where, whether it acts upon the body, 
the mind, or the heart. Nor does it mend 



224 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

their condition very much to be able to say in 
the great day of account, that they did it in 
sport, or even to obtain a livelihood. 

But you may, perhaps, regard this as a 
digression. Be it so. Before we return, how- 
ever, let me give you one or two cautions. 

Should you be so fortunate as to escape the 
deteriorating influences of the whole para- 
phernalia of physical, intellectual, and moral 
excitement ; and should the temptation pre- 
sent itself of spreading before the public, as a 
means of gaining a subsistence for yourself 
and family, such things as I have referred to, 
remember that you are not now in the condi- 
tion of those whose minds have never been at 
all enlightened on this subject. Weigh well 
the consequences of your conduct, before you 
act. Remember your accountability to God, 
and to future generations. 

Again, should you be placed, in the arrange- 
ments of the Divine Providence, at the head 
of a family, remember that he who in his 
wisdom seemed to concentrate all wisdom, 
when he said, " Train up a child in the way 
he should go, and when he is old he will not 



MENTAL EXCITANTS. 225 

depart from it" — enjoyed the very best of 
opportunities for knowing the tendency of 
an overfondness for physical excitement, to 
awaken and feed the fire (already raging with- 
in), of the appetites and passions. Remem- 
ber, I say, and beware ! 

I have before intimated, that I hardly know 
what to advise a young man, in regard to 
exciting books, except to steer clear of them 
all. He has not the power, if he had the 
disposition, to burn up all the volumes in the 
Christian world, as Omar (I believe it was he) 
did in the Mohammedan. Nor would he 
accomplish his purpose of ridding the world 
of them, if he did. Like the fabled Phoenix, 
others just like them would rise from their 
ashes. Worse than this, perhaps, would hap- 
pen. Like the exorcised man in the gospel- — 
seven spirits more wicked than the first would 
be substituted. 

Besides, such a conflagration is by no means 
desirable. Amid the books, magazines and 
papers, which have come up among us, like 
the frogs upon Egypt, we have many that are 
excellent. A young man is not obliged to 
10* 



226 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

buy or read Bulwer, Byron and Eugene Sue, 
because he finds them in a bookstore kept by 
a good man, or because he sees others buy 
and read them. He may deny himself in this 
particular, as well as in many others. 

No cross, no crown, was a maxim of Penn, 
and a wise one. I am not at all certain that 
He who continually brings good out of eyil, 
and causes even the wrath of man to praise 
him, may not have it in contemplation to raise 
up a better class of men and women than the 
world has yet seen, by means of these very 
excitements of which I have been speaking in 
this letter ; I mean now, indirectly. For if it 
be true, that without cross, there is no crown ; 
then is it not also true, that the greater the 
cross, the greater the crown, provided it be 
well sustained ! 

Let him, therefore, who in the arrangements 
of the family to which he belongs, is placed 
at a table where excitants abound, remember 
that this is his trial — his cross. Here may 
be, at the least, the very lessons which, if 
properly studied, are to teach him the way 
of self-denial and self-renunciation. How can 



MENTAL EXCITANTS. 227 

a person be expected to deny himself and take 
up his cross, in the larger, less frequently re- 
curring affairs of life, who has not first learned 
to deny himself in small matters ? 

The same remarks and the same admoni- 
tion may apply to the case of those before 
whom exciting intellectual and moral food is 
continually presented. If they govern the 
appetite — which incessantly cries, Give, give — - 
in these smaller occurrences, may they not 
hope to pave the way for self-government in 
larger matters, whenever the time of trial 
shall come ? 

We need not, therefore, to pray to our Father 
in Heaven, that he would take our young men 
out of the world, in order that they may be 
what he designed they should be ; but only 
that he will keep them from its evils. And 
suiting the action to the word, as we should 
pray, so we should labor. Our yoimg men 
must soon be old ones ; let the desire and 
prayer of the heart, and the labor of the 
hands, have such a tendency that they may 
better sustain the burdens of society and glo- 
rify God, than their fathers have done. For 



228 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

until each generation shall be as an improved 
edition of that which precedes it, the work of 
God, delegated to man on earth, will never be 
accomplished. 



LETTER XXVIL 

RESPECT FOR AGE. 

I remember, well, the time when the young 
rose up before the aged, whether their age was 
honorable or otherwise. They did not stay to 
inquire about their merit ; it was sufficient that 
they were gray-headed. 

The rule was, in families, to avoid going 
between older persons and the fireplace, 
around which, in a sort of semicircle, the 
family were often ranged. Or if it became 
necessary to pass before older persons, in these 
circumstances, they were to make obeisance 
to them. This, I say, was the rule — that it 
was not always rigidly adhered to, does not 
alter the matter of fact. 

On leaving the room, even though none but 



230 



LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 



our friends were present, obeisance was again 
required ; and so also on returning. If a child 
or youth passed an older person, or — what was 
indeed the same thing — if another person 
passed by him, he was expected and required 
to bow to him most respectfully and profound- 
ly. Not however till the head was uncovered. 

I have seen well nigh half a hundred school 
pupils range themselves — as it were instinc- 
tively, and even instantly — in a row, as an 
individual a little older than themselves ap- 
proached their play-ground. And I have seen 
this long row, with hat or bonnet in hand, so 
far as hats and bonnets were in use among 
them, make one simultaneous bow and cour- 
tesy to the passer by — no doubt as much to 
their own satisfaction, as to his personal exal- 
tation. 

At the school-room too, in those days, no 
pupil was accustomed to receive any thing at 
the hands of a teacher or his assistant, without 
a most reverent and unqualified obeisance. 
So on coming into the school-room, whether at 
the opening of the school or at recess ; and so 



RESPECT FOR AGE. 231 

also, at all times, and in all circumstances, 
when in the act of leaving it. 

Nor was this all. At table, if indeed the 
young sat at the table with those who were 
older, (which was not always permitted,) the 
former, unless spoken to, were expected to be 
silent. If they wanted any thing, however, 
they might ask for it ; but the request was 
to be accompanied, or rather prefaced by a 
Please Sir, or Please Ma'am. 

Especially was youth required to bow low 
— not to say fawn and creep — before age in- 
vested with power or dignity, whether or not 
that power and dignity were well used. In 
some of our higher seminaries it would have 
been thought criminal, indeed absolutely 
rebellious, not to take off the hat, and retain it 
in hand while the professor or tutor was pass- 
ing ; and many a reprimand, if not actual ex- 
pulsion, has grown out of delinquencies of 
this same general character. 

And once more. All the customs of our 
social circles, festive boards, public amuse- 
ments, and arrangements for divine worship, 
were based on the broad principle that respect 



232 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

should and must be rendered by the young 
to the old. The arm-chair and the stool and 
cricket, the more elevated seat and the mere 
slab bench, the high bed and the trundle bed, 
the body of the church and the gallery — these, 
and many more things which could be named 
in the same connection, all looked the same 
way. Even the congregation at church was 
seated with sole reference to age. The aged 
fathers and mothers were seated nearest the 
deacons' pew and the pulpit, while the rest 
were placed nearer or more remote from the 
last, according as they were nearer or more 
remote from them in years. 

Such a thing as seating a congregation on 
any other principle was not known, in the re- 
gion of New England where I was brought up, 
till within fifty years. No gray-headed man, 
because he was poor, was forced to sit remote 
from the preacher, in some dark corner, where, 
from his growing infirmities, he could scarcely 
hear what was said to him. The gospel, in 
those days, was for the poor, as well as for the 
rich, just as its Author intended it. 

Yet, while I would commend, even with 



RESPECT FOR AGE. 233 

warmth, some of the forms of showing respect 
for the aged which prevailed half a century 
ago, I would not be understood as seeming to 
endorse them all. I would not carry the cus- 
tom of making bows and courtesies, in family 
or in school, to an extreme which savors of tith- 
ing the mint and cummin, while the weightier 
matters are omitted. I would not require the 
young to be so scrupulous about "manners," 
during the hours of study, labor, or recreation, 
as to defeat the great ends for which these 
things were designed. 

Why should the young, during the school 
recess, while busy at their plays, (as necessary 
to them as their graver studies,) be compelled to 
arrange themselves in rows to make obeisance 
to the passing stranger? Why should they, 
even, be expected to stop their amusements at 
all ? Why take any notice of the passer by, 
except to see that they do not obstruct his 
way ? 

True it is, that if spoken to, I would have 
them reply, and add thereto a movement of 
the head, especially if the person who speaks to 
them is greatly their superior in point of years. 



234 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

And if children, at school or at home, stand 
gazing at the traveller as he passes, it is but 
reasonable that they should make their obei- 
sance to him. 

Perhaps it is unnecessary, in a letter to 
young men, to be thus minute in regard to the 
duty of the mere schoolboy. Let it be remem- 
bered, however, that I am merely endeavoring 
to illustrate the principles I would inculcate. 
I wish to leave the general impression, that 
mankind every where, and in all ages, are 
prone to extremes — in avoiding one rock of 
error, apt to run on another. The customs of 
our ancestors were founded in truth, only they 
carried them to an unwise extreme. 

And yet, in departing from the extreme into 
which they fell, have we not gone into an 
opposite extreme still less wise, and still more 
unjustifiable ? Is it reasonable for the young, 
so generally, to place themselves on a level 
with the old ? Is it reasonable that they should 
assume that wisdom and experience, which, if 
they do not always accompany age, are never 
to be acquired without it ? 

Is it reasonable that the young should take 



RESPECT FOR AGE. 235 

to themselves the right of occupying the best 
seats, where a choice is to be had ; whether at 
home, or abroad ; whether at church or at the 
concert, and whether the occasion be grave or 
solemn ? Have we not gospel rules — examples 
rather — from which the wise young man may 
receive timely hints for the government of his 
conduct in this matter ? What, then, are we to 
learn from the earnest injunction not to take the 
highest seats at weddings, feasts, &c. ? Shall 
youth claim a right, in the presence and com- 
pany of the aged, which even the gospel of the 
Lord Jesus Christ, republican as it is — I had 
almost said, ultra republican — does not con- 
cede to those who are older, in the presence of 
their supposed equals ? 

The question will perhaps be asked — But 
what shall we do, when age lays claim to su- 
periority — and makes large claims, too ? Shall 
the young be expected to concede all that the 
old may arbitrarily desire ? 

Such a question is a pertinent one. I have 
seen age make very unreasonable claims. Old 
men are not always wise. I have seen chil- 
dren compelled to sit for an hour or two, when 



236 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

they were quite uncomfortable, that age might 
not be disturbed in its follies — when it would 
have been equally happy, had it yielded a lit- 
tle more liberty to those over whom Providence 
had given it unlimited control. 

Yet, after all, the general demand, both of 
reason and revelation, is, submission ; — I mean, 
to the higher authority. The powers that be, 
in the family at the least, are ordained by God. 
If by mild and gentle expostulation, or even 
by respectful request, I could not gain what I 
conceived to be my rights, I would yield them, 
at once. Better to suffer, in well-doing, than 
be guilty of evil-doing. Is it not so ? 

These collisions, moreover, to which I now 
refer — to which, indeed, all the remarks of this 
chapter refer — take place at an age when 
young persons are more likely to mistake con- 
cerning their own rights than at any other. 
This shall be my principal apology for dwell- 
ing a few moments longer on so important a 
subject. 

As the individual passes from boyhood to 
youth, and from youth to manhood, his size 
increases faster than his experience. He is 



RESPECT FOR AGE. 237 

more a man physically, than he is intellectu- 
ally and morally. He is not, as yet — say at 
fourteen or fifteen — wise enough to know that 
size and strength are not the standard by 
which he is to be measured, and by which he 
ought not to measure himself. He has fallen 
into the mistaken notion that old folks, gener- 
ally, are fools, and that as each successive gen- 
eration, collectively, is wiser than that which 
preceded it, so he is wiser than the generation 
next before him. A remark this is, however, 
which I have made in another letter. 

This mistake, so common with young men, 
is most influential at precisely the period of 
life when it is most dangerous. Were it to be 
made while they are very young, it would be 
less hurtful ; or were it deferred to a period 
which brings with it a little more experience 
and a great deal more humility, it would also 
prove comparatively harmless. Or at least, 
coming at either of these seasons, it would not 
so often result in abuses and excesses. It 
would be palliated, in its effects, by other cir- 
cumstances. 

There is a period in every young man's 



238 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

history, when dangers of every kind thicken 
around him, and seem to threaten inevitable 
destruction. I allude, of course, to the stormy 
period when we are said to pass the Terra 
del Fuego of life's journey. And such is the 
violence, to most, of the storms that assail at 
this critical period, that we are not to wonder 
if thousands and millions of our race are left 
to suffer, under their influence and their own 
inexperience, a most fatal and terrible ship- 
wreck. 

For it is not a little remarkable, that just at 
this time, when all other restraints begin to lose 
their hold on a young man, the passions not 
only rage with most violence, but are most un- 
willing to brook the least restraint. The same 
is true of all the appetites. Were parental 
influence growing stronger at this juncture, or 
were that influence which is exerted by good 
and virtuous sisters on the increase at this 
time, the state of things to which I refer would 
be less unhappy. 

But, alas ! no father, or mother, or brother, 
or sister, can, at this dangerous hour, do much 
to lessen the dangers that so terribly threaten. 



RESPECT FOR AGE. 239 

Parents are fools, and sisters weak, in the esti- 
mation of young men. All wisdom, or almost 
all, seems bestowed by Heaven just to make 
bright and glorious their own happy pathway ; 
and to die with them, for aught they know or 
care, when their own mortal journey is com- 
pleted ! 

There is but one condition of things — ex- 
traneous to the reason and good sense of the 
young man himself — that can do much to 
lessen the danger, at this time, of making a 
most fatal shipwreck. Blessed be God, who 
in his wise Providence has ordained that a 
new bond of attachment should spring up, just 
now, to save from absolute, inevitable, and irre- 
trievable destruction 

I do not say that this bond always holds, as 
with an omnipotent power. Yet I do say, that, 
besides it, none but Omnipotence can restrain 
us. It is not John Newton* alone that has 

* Most of my readers doubtless know that Mr. Newton 
was early employed in the slave trade to Africa, and, by the 
force of the storm within and the temptation without, was 
often in danger. Having formed an early and abiding attach- 
ment, however, this bond, as an anchor, held him. The 



240 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

felt the restraint ; but every son of Adam, who 
has reached the age of puberty and witnessed 
the results accomplished by puberty on those 
around him. And if the mighty cord has not 
wholly held him to the paths of purity, it has 
done all it could. What he is, he owes, under 
God, to what it has done. But on this and 
several kindred topics I hope to have room to 
enlarge on another occasion. 

Happy the young man who, at the danger- 
ous Terra del Fuego of human life, avails 
himself of every help which God in Provi- 
dence and nature has proffered him. Let him 
set his sails for every needed pilot, and let him 
give due heed to every needful and available 
monitor, whether internal or external. 

Young men need counsel at every period 
and hour of their existence — but most of all, 
at that perilous season when the necessity is 
least perceived. Let them keep hold of the 
parent's arm here, if nowhere else. Let fe- 
male influence be felt here, if nowhere else. 
Let conscience utter her monitory voice here, 

thought, What would she think of me, if I yield to indiscre- 
tion ? often, as he says, saved him. 



RESPECT FOR AGE. 241 

if nowhere else ; and here, at this precise 
point — the point of danger — let her voice be 
heard and heeded. Nor let the voice of him 
whose mandates are higher than conscience be 
overlooked or forgotten. 

But I am anticipating. My business just 
now is, to encourage in the young a due 
respect for the aged ; especially at a period 
when such respect seems to be, in the common 
course of things, almost obliterated. It is not 
true that respect for the old — the disposition to 
consider yourself as second to him — is only 
becoming while you are in the merest child- 
hood and infancy. It is becoming always. It 
is not only becoming — it is a virtue. It is as 
pleasing to God as it is acceptable to man. 

One thought more on this topic, and I will 
close this long letter. Respect for age will nev- 
er lower your reputation among your equals. 
Some young men there are who think or seem 
to think it such a mark of weakness to respect 
age, that they have not the moral courage to 
do that which they would otherwise think, 
in the nature of things, perfectly right. Now 
I will not deny that there are individuals 
11 



242 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

to be found, with whom they will lose some- 
thing by respecting and reverencing the old. 
They take the highest place — age or no age — 
and others may take care of themselves. But 
let not the young be deceived. These very 
individuals know better than they say, all the 
while. They may laugh at you outwardly, 
but they cannot help respecting you inwardly. 
Or if they contrive to brave it through to the 
end of life, a day is coming when they will 
view the matter very differently — a day when, 
in the presence of assembled worlds, they will 
not be slow to confess that, though honorable 
age may not always be that which standeth in 
multitude of years, yet age, whether honorable 
or dishonorable, is to be respected and cher- 
ished. You have read the story of Fidelia — 
who, though one of the most accomplished 
women of her age, devoted herself to hex aged 
father ; and felt most at home, not in treating 
him with a want of due respect, but with all 
those little attentions which his age required — 
even putting on his slippers. Go and do thou 
likewise. 



LETTER XXVIIL 

DUTIES TO THE AGED. 

The remarks made at the close of my last 
letter concerning Fidelia, remind me of the 
duties of the young to the aged, especially to 
their own parents. These are numerous and 
weighty. 

It is by no means sufficient to have a, gene- 
ral respect for those who are older than our- 
selves, though without this no young man is 
well fitted for the journey of life. We should 
have more than a general respect for them ; — 
they must be nourished and cherished — as in 
our own bosoms. Precious beyond all price 
are these relics of a gone-by generation, even 
though connected to us by no ties of blood. 

For has it never occurred to you in your 
search for happiness — for the young are exceed- 



244 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

ingly active in this search — has it never oc- 
curred to you, I say, that, instead of satisfying 
yourself with merely treating age with a sort 
of general respect as matter of duty, such treat- 
ment should be one of your highest pleasures 
— a thing which involves some of your highest 
and most important interests ? 

You have heard of the love of Jacob for his 
grandchildren as well as for his children — and 
are not ignorant that the lives of the old are as 
it were bound up in those of the young. Nay, 
you must have often observed this trait of old 
age, in those who are around you. But is 
there to be no reciprocation of feeling? Do 
the old love the young, with a love that is 
unquenchable, and have the young no love 
for the old ? Is there nothing to be done on 
their part, but to show them a cold, or at most 
a lukewarm respect ? Has God so ordered it ? 

An aged domestic animal may be turned 
aside, when no longer useful, and the owner 
incur no guilt. Such, at least, is the stern 
decree of society. But can humanity, in its 
decline, be thus treated, and the agent of its 



DUTIES TO THE AGED. 245 

cruel neglect be blameless ? Can it be so, in 
the nature of things ? 

Can the young even approximate to such a 
course and be blameless? Yet what son is 
there among us who does not thus approxi- 
mate ? Who — where is he that comes up to 
the full measure of the great command of God 
which requires us to honor age, especially in 
our aged parents ? 

If I understand, correctly, the duties of the 
young towards the aged — the aged parent 
more particularly — they are all comprised in a 
few words. The general injunction might be 
framed thus : In all the circumstances of your 
lives, so conduct as to make the most of your 
parents — their health, reputation, virtue, tal- 
ents, piety, &c. — and this in their hundredth 
year no less than in their fiftieth. 

Did not Fidelia's reputation rise at every 
thing she did to make the most of an aged and 
decrepit parent ? Bad as the world is, it can- 
not resist the claims of filial piety. He who 
labors, in season and out of season, to husband 
the waning resources of a declining ancestor, 



246 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

is laboring with most of efficiency to advance 
his own reputation, even though he were act- 
ing solely on selfish principles. 

I have seen a young man who, as his pa- 
rents advanced along the decline of life, seemed 
to think it for his interest to hide them from 
society. They might, indeed, be well fed and 
clothed — properly foddered, as one might say ; 
but this was all he cared for. And even this 
supply for the wants of their bodies might 
have been bestowed grudgingly, but for the 
selfish fear of losing reputation by it. 

I have seen this same young man, with a 
view to place himself in the foreground, and 
throw his aged parents into obscurity, contrive 
to remove them from the home of their whole 
lives — from the cradle to seventy — that he 
might occupy the mansion himself, and con- 
sign them to a small tenement in a retired part 
of the village, where they could scarcely see 
or be seen, at least by any but the authors of 
their exile ; nor by them as long as inclination 
or interest called them in another direction. 

I have known the same young man proceed 
a step farther, and having fairly ejected both 



DUTIES TO THE AGED. 247 

parents from their much-loved mansion and 
long-cherished home, dwell with so much and 
such frequent interest on the benefits likely to 
result to himself from their decease, as actually 
to express a willingness to have them out of 
the way ; or, as he said, to have them freed 
from their trials and troubles and infirmities. 

Now, can it be possible that such a young 
man has any right views of his duties to the 
aged — especially to aged parents? What! 
bound to make the most of them at every step 
of life, and yet practically make the least of 
them he possibly can ? 

Does he not know they love the young? 
That they live much in the past, and take 
much delight in repeating the past ? That in 
order to dwell much in the past, they must 
have constant access to that other extreme of 
society, that lives and delights to live almost 
wholly in the future ? For the love of story- 
telling is not stronger in the old than the love 
to hear stories is in the young, and God made 
the two to go together. And what God has 
joined together, will man presume to put 
asunder ? 



248 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Besides, the old are more healthy, much 
more so, in the society of the young. They 
need the stimulus of that society, much more 
than when they were in active life. Then, 
their minds were occupied. They were buy- 
ing and selling, marrying or giving in mar- 
riage. They had something before them. Now 
all these things are over with them ; especially 
when banished from the world to a corner of 
a field, or some other secluded spot. 

Let me entreat you, my young friends, to 
make such arrangements as shall keep your 
aged parents in the society of one or another — 
several, if possible — of their children. It is a 
duty you owe to them ; but it is much more : it 
is a duty you owe to yourselves. They have ac- 
quired a vast amount of experience which they 
have not yet learned to transmit on paper, but 
which will be of inestimable worth to you, if 
you can obtain it. Now by enjoying their 
society, and giving them an opportunity to 
enjoy yours, you will afford, them an opportu- 
nity, from time to time, to bring out, in the 
form of stories, as I have already said, just 



DUTIES TO THE AGED. 249 

that sort of information which you and your 
children need, and in just the right shape. 

It is sometimes said that the old cannot 
be connected with the families of their chil- 
dren without exercising that freedom which 
often results in a degree of uneasiness — to call 
it by a name no worse — about the children. 
All this I understand, most fully. But they 
need not be in the same family with the 
young in every particular, nor even in the 
same house. They may retain — it is bet- 
ter that they should — the old mansion, and 
you may build near them. We do not hear 
of any quarrel between the families of Jacob 
and Joseph on account of Joseph's children. 

I have not yet mentioned one highly impor- 
tant reason why the young should make as 
much as possible of the old. It is, that they 
may have the full benefit of their judgment 
in matters of business, &c. For, though the 
young are apt to think they know more than 
the old when they are at fifteen, they find 
out their mistake at twenty, or twenty-five ; 
and that advice and guidance — and above 
all that authority — which they would have 
11* 



250 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

slighted then, they will now receive with thank- 
fulness—and will even solicit it. 

Startle not at the word authority, which has 
just been used. It is only in the earliest years 
of life that the parent should be an autocrat 
in his family. In subsequent years, his com- 
mands must be such as will commend them- 
selves to the free agency of those for whom 
they are designed. But this species of author- 
ity does not cease — or rather should not — at 
exactly twenty-one, as too many suppose. The 
same species of authority which is proper at 
sixteen, is proper at twenty-one ; and that 
which is really needful at twenty-one, does 
not entirely cease to be necessary at twenty- 
two, or twenty-five, or even thirty. In truth, 
it remains as long as the parties remain in 
existence. 

But if parental authority, though it may 
slightly wane, should not cease but with the 
last pulsation of parental life, then it follows, 
of course, that obedience, on the part of the 
young, ought not to cease at an earlier period. 
Authority on the one part implies submission 



DUTIES TO THE AGED. 251 

on the other, and of course cannot exist with- 
out it. 

Such views as these — in these days of pseu- 
do republicanism— may not, I know, be very 
popular. But I have another thing to aim at 
in these letters besides being popular. I am 
to state the truth, according to my views of it, 
without fear of losing favor, as well as without 
an overweening desire to receive it. The truth 
is, that insubordination has been the order of 
the day, in these United States, and even in 
this land of the Puritans ; and the whole 
length and breadth of society are infected by 
it. And it is almost as much as a man's repu- 
tation is worth to set himself against it. Nor 
will subordination be very soon restored, un- 
less it can be done through the medium of the 
family and the school ; for the genius of our 
government tends to perpetuate it. 



LETTER XXIX. 

POLITICS AND POLITICAL DUTIES. 

While the young need information at al- 
most every step of life, I know of few things 
in regard to which counsel is more needed — 
the counsel of old men, even — than on the 
subject of their political conduct and duties. 

Mankind, young and old, are so constituted 
as to be prone to extremes. In departing from 
Scylla, they are apt to fall on Charybdis. This 
is especially the case in the matter of politics. 

Here is a young man, for example, scarcely 
in his teens, who knows more, in his own 
estimation, by one half, than his neighbors of 
thirty, forty, and fifty. He can discuss with 
unblushing boldness the merits of all our presi- 
dential and gubernatorial candidates. He 
knows because he knows, and if he can render 
no reason it makes little difference to himself. 



POLITICS POLITICAL DUTIES. 253 

The modest young man, disgusted with his 
blustering, goes to the opposite extreme, and 
declares, in haste, that he will have nothing to 
do with politics ; and ten to one but he carries 
his threat into execution. He falls as far short 
of the true course as the other goes beyond it. 

Or, it may happen occasionally, that the 
blustering politician i of twelve or fifteen may 
himself become disgusted, and fall upon the 
opposite extreme. Such things have come un- 
der my observation during the last fifty years, 
and may not have escaped the observation of 
others. 

One reason why young men move in this 
way — that is, run from one extreme to another 
— is that they have no conscience in the mat- 
ter, and no good reason for supposing that 
others have. They take up their opinions 
either upon trust, or by chance, and they hold 
and profess them as a mere matter of conveni- 
ence or amusement. In short, to them, politics 
is little more than a game, into which they as 
little think of carrying any thing in the shape 
of conscience, as to a billiard-table or a checker- 
board. 



254 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Need I say to the intelligent young men of 
our own intelligent republic, that all this is 
wrong ? Need I remind you of the great truth 
so often and so earnestly insisted on by Paul, 
that whether we eat or drink, or whatsoever 
we do, we are bound to do all to the glory of 
God ? This is, indeed, a rule for Christians ; 
but am I writing for any other ? Is there a 
young man who reads one of my letters through, 
who does not acknowledge the divine authority 
of Christianity ? 

To do a thing to the glory of God, is to do it 
in such a manner as will be acceptable to him. 
It is to perform it as a matter of duty — not 
without, but with a conscience. I entreat you 
to remember this. Whatever is worth doing 
in this world, is worth doing well. But to do 
a thing well, we must regard ourselves as un- 
der obligations to high heaven to do it right — 
that is, conscientiously. 

You are to attend to your political duties in 
the fear of God, and with a sense of accounta- 
bility to him for the manner in which you dis- 
charge them, just as much as you are to go to 
church in this way. But on this point do not 



POLITICS POLITICAL DUTIES. 255 

misunderstand me. I am not placing your 
duties to God and those to your fellow-men on 
a par with each other. I have not the remotest 
thought of doing so. All I mean to say is, that 
duty is as truly duty in the one case as in the 
other. It may be higher in the one case than 
in the other — indeed, it is so — but then both are 
equally duty ; and, in their respective places, 
equally binding. 

But if the duties we owe to our fellow-beings 
in the shape of political duties are to be thus 
sacredly regarded, then it follows that they are 
matters about which every young man ought 
to be enlightened. He ought not to be permit- 
ted to grow to manhood in almost utter ignor- 
ance of this whole subject. And yet such is 
the unhappy condition of most of our Ameri- 
can young men ! 

This word American, to my own apprehen- 
sion, speaks volumes. Young men of America 
— free, enlightened, and comparatively happy 
America — is it to you that I am permitted thus 
to write ? Exalted privilege ! may it never be 
abused. And may you never, in the plenitude 
of your freedom, * find yourselves disposed to 



256 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

make light of those counsels which, though 
they come from age, are yet warm from a heart 
that age has not yet chilled or contracted. 

You are bound to make yourselves acquaint- 
ed — familiarly so — with the geography and 
history of your own country. Is it said, that 
at the present day, every one is thus instruct- 
ed ? Not so fast. The great majority of our 
young men know almost nothing, practically, 
about either. They may have recited at the 
schools on both. But their recitations have 
been, for the most part, mere parrot work. 
They were words of others, and not ideas of 
their own. 

Some of you may be inclined to ask what 
this thorough knowledge of the geography and 
history of one's own country has to do with the 
proper and conscientious discharge of our poli- 
tical duties. It has every thing to do with it. 
Why do you take a deeper interest in the wel- 
fare of places you have resided in, or seen, than 
in places which you never saw, and of which 
you have a very faint, or very crude concep- 
tion ? Why would you sooner defend them ? 
Is it not because they are to you realities? 



POLITICS POLITICAL DUTIES. 257 

Then become familiarly acquainted with the 
whole country of which you are an inhabitant, 
that all parts of it, and the interests of all parts 
will be realities to you. 

There is as great a difference between two 
young men at the ballot-box — or in the battle- 
field, even, if battle-field there must be — one of 
whom is thoroughly and practically a geogra- 
pher, and the other grossly ignorant on this 
whole subject, as can possibly be conceived. 
The former is far more ready to have a due 
regard to the rights of those who are to be af- 
fected by his conduct or his vote, than the lat- 
ter. Nor is he as readily influenced unduly by 
the example or persuasion of others. He can- 
not as readily be bought and sold. 

Mankind, unintelligent and unprincipled, are 
very much like the herding animals. They do 
this or that because others do it, and not be- 
cause it is right. They are thinking — if they 
think at all — of their responsibility to those 
around them, and not of their responsibility to 
conscience and to God. They are far more 
likely to ask, What will others say, than What 
does God say ? or Is it right ? 



258 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

They go where their own clan, or party, or 
sect, or neighborhood are going. If they do 
not go to the polls at all, believing it to be a 
matter of no consequence, many a young mam 
follows their example. If they go for a par- 
ticular candidate or measure, it is sufficient, 
they seem to say, if they do the same. If they 
go to destruction, the young man who is unin- 
structed and unprincipled will be apt to go 
with them. 

But in proportion as a young man can be 
made to acquaint himself with the geography 
and history of his own country — especially 
such a country as ours — he will be apt to take 
an interest in its true welfare, not only as a 
whole, but as composed of various and numer- 
ous parts. True, this is not all which is re- 
quired of him. He must study the constitution 
and laws of his country. I do not mean to say 
he must devote his life to this study, for that 
were impracticable, except his object were to 
become a lawyer, a jurist, or a statesman. 

Nor are these things all. Every young man 
is under obligation to understand well the cus- 
toms, habits, manners, and institutions of his 



POLITICS POLITICAL DUTIES. 259 

country. Travelling is indeed greatly useful 
for this latter purpose ; but then there are sub- 
stitutes for this. Others have travelled for us, 
and have given us the results of their observa- 
tion and reflections. And since no one young 
man can do every thing, you will act the wise 
part in consulting the best of our authorities 
on the subject. 

Do not tell me you have no time for making 
yourself acquainted with the matters to which 
I have referred ; for it is not so. You may not, 
I am w~ell aware, have as much time to spare 
as might seem desirable. And yet you have 
time enough to learn how to perform your 
duty. 

God is not a hard master — gathering where 
he has not strewed — he requires nothing of you 
in the way of duty, but what you have time 
and ability to do. If he has given you the 
right of suffrage, and required you to exercise 
it under the light of the nineteenth century, 
and under the genius of institutions and con- 
stitutions like our own, he has given you time 
to study those institutions and constitutions. 

As one of your duties, in this life, you are to 



260 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

"redeem your time." Now how much time 
have you hitherto suffered to run to waste in 
reading which was wholly useless, and in con- 
versation which was equally so ? Understand 
me, however. I am a friend to conversation 
as a means of improvement, as well as to read- 
ing. But then there is not a little time spent 
in conversation which amounts to just nothing 
at all, except to amuse. 

Such is most of the common conversation on 
petty and party politics, of which so many 
young men are excessively fond. It does not 
qualify them in the slightest degree for the 
performance of their duties as the free citizens 
of a free country. Time thus spent — I repeat 
it — ought to be redeemed. 

Nor is it to be redeemed by reading, any 
more than by conversing on the little and be-lit- 
tling things to which I have alluded, and which 
fill so many of the columns of our newspapers 
in these days. It will require the efforts of 
more than one generation of young men who 
shall be true to themselves, their country, and 
their God, to remove the evils which those 
pests of society — worse than the scourges of 



POLITICS POLITICAL DUTIES. 261 

ancient Egypt — have inflicted on our land. 
They have not only pandered to a miserable 
taste, but they have created such a taste where 
it did not before exist. 

How can a true friend of his country repress 
the emotions which are roused by the consid- 
eration of the abuses which have been heaped 
upon us by— not the freedom of expression, but 
— the licentiousness, and lightness, and sophis- 
try, even, of some of these publications. Need 
I urge you to shun their corrupting portions and 
parts, as you would shun the plague or the 
cholera, and to redeem your time because the 
days are evil ? 



LETTER XXX. 

FEMALE SOCIETY. 

The Author of the world we live in might, 
for aught we know, have arranged things very 
differently. Instead of giving but one globe to 
eight hundred or a thousand millions of our 
race, he might have divided this larger globe 
into a thousand million smaller ones, and 
assigned one of these to each individual. 

Then, again, instead of making provision for 
successive generations of his creatures, he 
might have formed them on the solitary plan, 
and allowed them to live on, l sole monarch ? 
each of his own domain, for thousands — per- 
haps, thousands of millions — of years. 

But such is not the Divine arrangement — 
such, in our own terrestrial sphere, it never 
will be. The decree has gone forth from the 



FEMALE SOCIETY. 263 

council chamber of the Eternal ; It is not g$od 
for man to be alone. It is not good for man 
individually — it is not good for him collect- 
ively. The sum total of human happiness, no 
less than of human usefulness, would be 
greatly diminished if all mankind — whether 
of one sex or two — were to live hermits. 

Hence the necessity of the conjugal relation, 
whose office is twofold — to complete the educa- 
tion of the parties themselves, and to be the 
means of human progress and improvement 
through another generation. Hence it is that 
man shall leave father and mother and cleave 
to his wife, and that the bond shall not only 
be as strong as life itself, but as permanent. 
Hence, in one word, the family and the family 
state. 

Man, divinely appointed to be a social and 
not a solitary being, begins his career in the 
family. Were it possible for him to be cast 
forth on the wide world, like Caspar Hauser, 
and yet survive, he would be but the mere 
fragment of a being, and that fragment an 
almost useless one. Rough, rude, boisterous, 
and in one word but half-civilized — hewn, but 



264 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

not polished — he would very imperfectly fulfil 
his high destinies. It is not good for him to be 
without the pale of female influence, and hence 
he has been subjected to it. 

Few young men have any idea — the most 
faint or remote — how much they owe to the 
influence of mothers and sisters, especially the 
former. Young men at the best, and under 
the best influences, are often coarse, passionate, 
sensual — what then would they have been 
without maternal and sisterly influence ? If 
now, so often, they burst those bonds which 
should "make man mild and sociable to 
man," what would they be and do, if those 
bonds were weaker than now, or above all if 
they had never existed ? 

The influence, mutually, of brothers and 
sisters is wonderful. From the days of Cain, 
who was set over Abel to influence and to 
guide him, down to the present moment, the 
stronger and more masculine have been ap- 
pointed of heaven to rule over, by a wise and 
just influence, the feebler and more feminine. 

Nor is the influence wholly on the side of 
the more powerful sex. There is a reciproea- 



FEMALE SOCIETY. 265 

tion, and more than a reciprocation. Female 
influence — that of the weaker party — and pre- 
cisely for this reason that it is female influence, 
is even stronger than any other. 

Brothers, then, I say again, little know how 
much they owe to the influence of sisters. 
They would better know — though the experi- 
ence might be a sad one — had not the Divine 
mind planned the arrangement which we see 
of nearly an equal number of brothers and sis- 
ters in each family. At least the exceptions 
to this rule are so few as to constitute nothing 
more than exceptions. Dr. Rush used to ask 
those young patients who came to him with a 
bodily constitution well nigh ruined, if they 
had sisters. 

Despise not, then, O ye young men — as some 
of you affect to do — the other and weaker sex. 
Remember they are all sisters — sisters of some- 
body whom they influence. Nay, more than 
this, learn to esteem and love them. Lower 
them not, by word, look, deed, or thought, in 
their own estimation. 

On the contrary, do all in your power to in- 
crease rather than diminish their respect for 
12 



266 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

themselves, for so shall you take the most 
direct course to elevate your own sex. 

What if you are not brothers and sisters un- 
der the same father and mother ? You are still 
brethren and sisters of the same great family, 
whose members, from East to West, and from 
pole to pole, have one common interest. You 
are in an important sense the children of the 
same Heavenly Father. 

What can be a more lovely sight than that 
of brothers and sisters who truly love one 
another, and who seek to elevate, adorn and 
improve each other ? The sight is the more 
interesting from the fact that the licentious 
notions of Byron have been so frequently 
swallowed by the young. They have heard 
that every woman is at heart a rake, or some- 
thing worse, till they have been almost led to 
look with suspicion on their own sisters. 

Happy those who have learned that the re- 
verse of what is implied in the slander of 
Byron were more true. For except in those 
rare cases where the old adage that " a shame- 
less woman is the worst of men" becomes 



FEMALE SOCIETY. 267 

applicable, woman is by nature not only less 
rakish, but much purer than man. 

I have inquired, what can be more lovely 
than the sight of loving brothers and sisters 
under the same roof. But there is a sight still 
more interesting than even this. It is the sight 
of those who have bound themselves together, 
in the love and fear of the great Jehovah, for 
life. 

The former attachment partakes largely — it 
is inevitable — of the instinctive ; the latter is 
more closely allied to heaven and divine things. 
The former is apt to wane, as life passes on ; 
the latter ought to increase ; and if what it 
ought to be, does increase till life's termination. 

It is one of the most curious of all the Di- 
vine arrangements for social life — this new 
attachment of mankind to each other — pre- 
cisely at the time and under the circumstances 
which so imperiously require it. For what 
would become of you, O young man ! if it 
were so that just at the precise period when 
deprived of maternal and sisterly influence, 
and endowed with new and strong passions 



268 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

and appetites, you were to be cut asunder for- 
ever from the soft and tender ties which have 
hitherto bound you ? In passing the Terra del 
Fuego of human life who shall be your pilot ? 
Must you not experience a most dangerous and 
fatal shipwreck ? 

And yet, just at this critical moment of your 
life — this hour of great moral and social peril 
— behold a new and tender passion springing 
up, unlike that which bound you to the family 
circle, and yet in many respects more import- 
ant. Who is so blind as not to see, in this 
part of the Divine arrangement, the most 
boundless wisdom and the most infinite love ? 

And, if susceptible of gratitude at all, in 
whose heart does not gratitude spring up, 
while he contemplates this amazing proof that 
a Father is at the helm of the universe, " edu- 
cing good from ill," and blessing all who 
refuse not the blessing ? 

And now will any young man, whose heart 
is not like the nether millstone, permit himself 
to eye askance, and above all with disdain, 
that sex which was so manifestly designed in 
the good providence of God, not only to save 



FEMALE SOCIETY. 269 

him from perdition, but to lift him to the dignity 
of his real nature ? 

You love your mothers and sisters ; be ex- 
horted then to show your love to them, by se- 
curing in your own time and God's, such influ- 
ences as shall carry out and perfect the great 
work which your mothers and sisters have 
begun. In one word, seek the companionship 
of one who shall prove to you more than mother 
and sister both, and that for life. 

You will not have to live to the age of fifty 
years, in the present aspect of society and 
things, (as some of your predecessors have been 
compelled to do,) before you can spell out the 
true philosophy of society, and the true ends 
of conjugal life. God is showing the nations 
of the earth — and you cannot shut your eyes 
to the great lesson — that the world's true ad- 
vancement is to be brought about chiefly by 
means of individual, family, and neighborhood 
or church improvement. 

Governments have no power — the best of 
them — to reform mankind and hasten the latter 
day glory. Their power is always in propor- 
tion — as regards both quantity and quality — to 



270 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

individual and family elevation. It is so every- 
where ; but it is especially so in our own 
country. 



LETTER XXXL 

GENERAL DUTY OF MARRIAGE. 

In my last letter, I promised you something 
more on the great subject to which I then 
called your attention. My present purpose is 
to redeem, in part at least, the pledge there 
given. 

I have more than intimated in that letter, 
that matrimony is a duty, and I mean so. It 
should be regarded as such by both sexes, but 
especially by our own. It is a divine ordi- 
nance — as old almost as the creation. If 
order is heaven's first law, as Pope says, it 
does not seem to be earth's. The first general 
law here is, that man shall " leave father and 
mother, and cleave to his wife." 

The Scriptures do not say, I grant, that 



272 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

marriage shall take place at twenty or twenty- 
five, or thirty, or at any particular age. The 
general rule, I again affirm, is, that we shall 
marry. Like other general rules, however, 
it may, nay must admit of exceptions. Some 
there are, no doubt, that ought not to marry, 
on account of health. And there may be 
other circumstances in operation, for a time at 
least, equally imperative. 

I would not lay so much stress on this point 
— the duty of the young to " lay their course " 
for marriage, Avere it not that some very excel- 
lent persons of both sexes have stoutly denied 
the doctrine, and insisted that if we are free to 
do as we please in any thing, it is here. Now, 
I do not deny that we are free, even to do 
wrong. The Creator has never as yet made a 
decree for man that hinders him from doing 
what he pleases — probably he never will. We 
may, if we choose, refrain from eating and 
drinking, and starve ourselves to death, but 
starvation, we may be sure, forms no part of 
the plan of the Creator. He made us to eat 
and drink, and live. So also, he made us for 
matrimony. 



MARRIAGE. 273 

The motives to this duty, strong as they 
may be, are none too powerful. Appetite, 
affection, passion, ambition, fancy — all of 
them seem to be needed. They seem in- 
tended by the Creator. Not, of course, to 
rule ; but to have a subordinate place. Nor 
should they be too excitable. 

There is a wide difference between strength 
and excitability — and generally, in the case 
before us, they are in an inverse proportion to 
each other. In plain terms, the greater the 
excitability, the feebler the appetites and pas- 
sions ; and the greater the strength, on the 
contrary, the less the excitability. 

For notwithstanding the whole array of 
motives to this duty of matrimony, we see 
thousands and millions in the Old World, and 
quite too many in the New, who set them- 
selves against it. In some of our cities, for 
example, like Paris, marriage would seem to 
be almost unfashionable, and celibacy to have 
supplied its place. And this state of things 
will soon exist in our own country, unless the 
young can be thoroughly imbued with correct 
principles on this important subject. 



274 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

Some shelter themselves under the plea that 
matrimonial life is so expensive that they 
cannot maintain it. Once, they say, married 
life was as cheap as celibacy, for woman was 
both able and willing to do her part ; whereas, 
now-a-days, most women are either unable or 
unwilling to do any thing towards supporting 
a family. Woman, they say, marries now to 
be maintained ; not to help to maintain others. 

Others dread the cares and responsibilities 
which attach to this state of life. They 
might support one person besides themselves, 
they say ; but as for supporting half-a-dozen 
or a dozen more, they cannot for one moment 
think of it. And it cannot be right, they sup- 
pose, to be at the head of a family and not 
take care of it. 

Others again dread the confinement. God 
made me to be free, it is said — as free as the 
air. I enjoy that freedom ; and if I am not 
very useful in the world, I am sure I do no 
harm. And now shall I sign away this golden 
privilege ? Shall I confine myself to home all 
my days? Shall I not, on the contrary, 
remain free, as God made me ? 



MARRIAGE. 275 

Others, still, speak of the risk they run. 
" Marriage is at best but a lottery, in which 
there are many more blanks than prizes. And 
when the chance of an even match is so 
small, and the prospects of an ill-adapted, ill- 
assortedj unhappy selection, so numerous, 
why should I dare to adventure? Surely, if 
we must be miserable, it is better to be miser- 
able alone." 

And there are, lastly, those who speak of 
the evils of perpetuating disease. They have 
heard that consumption, scrofula, and many 
more diseases may be transmitted ; nay, that 
the mere bringing together of striking peculia- 
rities, has a tendency that way. But they 
have heard again, that almost every body is 
affected by inheritance in some way. And 
now, say they, what shall we do? You 
desire us to marry ; and yet advise us to avoid 
the sickly. Is not this to advise, where com- 
pliance is impossible ? 

Now these objections are all of them spe- 
cious, and a few of them weighty* True, they 
can be met, and most of them can be shown to 
be more specious than solid ; but to the young, 



276 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

some of them seem formidable. Let us see, 
then, to what, in reality, they amount, and how 
great the difficulty is which, to the young, ap- 
pears so well nigh insurmountable. 

Is it true, then, that the wife does not, in 
modern times, aid in bringing up a family? 
Does the whole burden devolve on the hus- 
band ? Or if it is so now, must it continue to 
be so? If woman is a slave to foolish and 
hurtful fashions, is there no release ? Can she 
not return at once to those simple habits and 
customs which prevailed in the last century, 
and which permitted woman to act her part in 
matrimonial life, as well as her husband ? 

You will say, perhaps : But women, now, 
have not strength for this. Some, yes, many, 
have not, I grant ; but if they can have a little 
respite from a constant round of drudgery, 
which is as unreasonable as it is silly, there is 
hope they may recover their vigor. Besides, 
there are a few among us who have as yet 
tolerable constitutions. 

And as to care, it is " the stuff that life is 
made of." More among us are sufferers be- 
cause they do not have care enough, than be- 



MARRIAGE. 277 

cause they have too much. Multitudes there 
are who 5 if they had somebody to care for, 
would not prey upon themselves as they now 
do. I acknowledge there is such a thing as 
being care-worn ; but, upon my word, I find 
fewer care-worn persons in matrimonial life, 
than in " single blessedness." 

You speak of the risk to be run. This may 
be greater or less, according to circumstances. 
If you are governed by wise principles in the 
selection of a partner for life, the risk is not so 
great as you may suppose. If reason and 
judgment predominate over fancy, your success 
will, after all, be something more certain that 
of drawing a prize in a lottery ! 

In forming an estimate of character, for ex- 
ample, you must not expect to come at truth 
in the concert, or at the ball, or the assembly- 
room. Here there is, practically, a mask drawn 
over every thing. To know a person thorough- 
ly, as she truly is, you must see her at home, 
in the domestic circle. Would you know her 
temper, you must observe its trials in small 
matters rather than larger ones. Thousands 
mistake here, and vainly suppose they under- 



278 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

stand character, when a borrowed part is acted 
rather than a real one. It is much easier to 
govern ourselves on a few great occasions, 
than in the thousand and one smaller items, of 
which real practical life is so essentially and so 
extensively made up. 

And, in the next place, you must study 
adaptation more than young men usually do. 
It is not by any means necessary that you and 
your companions should be alike in any thing 
except general purpose or aim. But it is in- 
dispensably necessary that there should be 
mutual adaptation to each other in a great va- 
riety of particulars. Some are of more, (that is. 
standing by themselves,) others of less impor- 
tance. 

There should be adaptation, physically. One 
should not be many years older than the other. 
Not only does much physical, but much social 
and moral evil, result from inattention to this 
circumstance. Most men, especially bachelors, 
are apt to prefer a companion in life, who is 
considerably younger than themselves; and, 
strange to say, not a few females prefer those 
who are older than they. 



MARRIAGE. 279 

On the other hand, if one party is tall, ex- 
perience appears to direct that the other should 
be rather short ; and if one is corpulent, that 
the other should be comparatively lean. It is 
still more important that if one be habitually 
too grave — an error by no means uncommon 
in this world— the other should be habitually 
mirthful. 

Intellectual adaptation is of little less impor- 
tance than physical. The one party should 
make up, so to speak, for deficiencies in the 
other. I do not mean to say that we should 
turn Mohammedans, and regard women as 
made only to complete man, or as having no 
separate, independent existence. And yet it is 
somewhat as if it were so. Men and women 
as they now exist, are but mere fragments of 
human beings, and it requires at least two of 
them to make up any thing like a decent 
whole. 

Moral and religious adaptation deserves to 
be considered among the rest. Some have 
been inclined wholly to omit this subject, in 
forming an estimate of the character of one 
whom they would select for life's journey. 



280 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

This seems to me no part of true wisdom. 
There must not only be charity in regard to 
differences of opinion, but the difference must 
not be too great at first setting out. otherwise 
there will be danger of collision. 

And then, finally, those who make the fore- 
going objections to matrimony, should remem- 
ber that however plain they may come up 
before the mind's eye, they must be still more 
plainly seen by God himself, who ordained 
matrimony. If, then, in view of all these dif- 
ficulties, God has said, It is not good for man 
to be alone, and. no repeal has ever been utter- 
ed, who shall withstand God ? What God has 
joined together, most surely man may not put 
asunder. 

Besides, the God who ordained matrimony, 
ordained also the existence of those who are to 
engage in it. He made them human beings, 
too, and not angels. And in assigning them 
their duty, he has nowhere required more of 
them than they are able to perform. In select- 
ing a companion for life, we are but to do the 
best we can. And 



MARRIAGE. 281 

" Who does the best his circumstance allows, 
Does well ; acts nobly — angels could no more." 

One thought more. I have barely alluded 
to age. The popular doctrine at present is, 
that we should marry young. I admit its 
truth, but what is young ? In some states of 
society, twenty-five or thirty would be regard- 
ed as such; in others, young would mean 
twenty or eighteen. 

This is a great and an important question. 
I have barely room to say that I consider 
twenty-five to twenty-eight, in our own sex, 
as young enough ; and twenty-two to twenty- 
five, in the other sex. Some, however, are as 
mature, physically, mentally, and morally, at 
twenty-five, as others are at twenty-eight. No 
young man is physically mature much sooner 
than twenty-five. 

Perhaps I owe you an apology, my young 
friends, for the familiarity with which I treat 
you and my subject. In a better state of so- 
ciety — one in which fathers did their whole 
duty— such instruction, from such a source, 



282 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

would not be demanded. Unite, then, your 
prayers and labors with mine, that such a 
state of society may one day exist ; nay, even 
that so golden a period mav not be far distant. 



LETTER XXXIL 

RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 

Many of you have seen a volume which made 
its appearance some years since, entitled, " In- 
fluence of Religion on Health," by a physician 
of eminence, containing not a few wholesome 
truths and important suggestions. And yet, so 
much has the worthy author confounded false 
religions with the true, and the abuse of Chris- 
tianity with its advantages, that you may have 
risen from the perusal of the work with a 
stronger tendency towards skepticism, than 
you had when you sat down. If these are 
the influences which religion exerts — you may 
have said to yourselves — then, the less we 
have to do with it, the better. 

Young men, in this country, arc naturally 



284 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

inclined to skepticism. The genius of our in- 
stitutions favors this tendency; that is, it does 
so indirectly. Not that there is more skepti- 
cism abroad in regard to religion, than in re- 
gard to many other things, especially medicine ; 
perhaps not so much— still, there is such a 
tendency. The freedom of our civil institu- 
tions, leads to free thinking. Men cast off 
many opinions in which they were educated, 
because they seem to them utterly unfounded ; 
and some, simply because they were educated 
in them. And in passing from one extreme, 
they are apt to go suddenly to another. In 
avoiding Scylla, they fall on Charybdis. 

It was to such a community, with such ten- 
dencies, that the "Influence of Religion on 
Health" brought an increase of skepticism. It 
performed a work which, in all probability, 
was never intended. But the impressions it 
left on the public mind — so manifestly errone- 
ous — are susceptible of being removed, and 
ought to be. Religion, pure and undefiled — in 
other words, Christianity, in its influences on 
human health and happiness — is very far from 
being unfavorable. On the contrary, as can 



RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 285 

be easily shown and clearly demonstrated, 
godliness is as profitable to this life, as it is for 
the life to come. And if so, instead of render- 
ing us skeptical, it ought to diminish our skep- 
ticism, by affording us one more internal proof, 
that religion is divine. For, can such a result 
or tendency, in a world like ours, be a matter 
of mere chance or hap-hazard? Is there no 
proof here, of design — nay, more, of benevolent 
intention ? 

Let us consider, in the first place, the ten- 
dencies of repentance and faith on our present 
well-being. I take these first, because it is 
these to which the gospel of our Lord and Sa- 
viour first directs our special attention. 

In taking the ground that repentance is fa- 
vorable to health and happiness here, I shall 
doubtless be met at once by the inquiry : But 
does not repentance for sin, involve grief and 
self-loathing, and other feelings of the depress- 
ing kind ? And can long-continued grief be 
healthful ? The reply to this inquiry is, that 
the best part of repentance is reformation. It 
is not necessary, in the nature of things, as 
God has established them, that we should con- 



286 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

tinue to grieve always ; if it were so, the result 
would most certainly be unfavorable. To live 
permanently and habitually under the in- 
fluence of any of the depressing passions, 
must ever be injurious both to body and soul. 
So that, after all, to repeat the statement — the 
best, and indeed the principal part of repent- 
ance, is reformation. The essential meaning 
of the foreign word whence the verb repent is 
derived, implies, as its leading idea, the act of 
turning. And to repent of sin, is to turn away 
from it. 

Now, who that has read the catalogue of 
vices which Paul makes out against the Ori- 
entals — and our modern catalogue would not 
be shorter — before their repentance, will doubt 
for a moment, whether or not the turning away 
from these is favorable to health ? Can it, by 
possibility, be otherwise than that to break 
away from licentiousness, intemperance, and 
anger, is to promote health and longevity, and 
thus to add to human happiness ? 

But if repentance is healthful and salutary, 
faith is much more so. The faith or confidence 
of infancy and childhood in parental love, can 



RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 287 

hardly be over-estimated ; and whether it have 
much or little resemblance to the faith of the 
child of God — that faith by which Abraham, at 
the command of his heavenly Father, went 
out, not knowing whither he went — is as cer- 
tainly salutary to the body as it is to the souL 

So is that common faith or confidence which 
men have in the constitution of things — or 
what we sometimes call nature. The agricul- 
turist who sows or plants his field in full faith, 
i. e. in full expectancy of a crop, is all the 
healthier for it. The merchant who, with the 
same faith, commits his ships to the seas, is a 
healthier man, other things being equal, than 
he who is faithless. Such men have a better 
circulation of the blood — have better lungs, 
brain, nerves, skin, &c— than other men, as 
could be demonstrated. 

I know of few things that can conduce more 
to happiness in this life than faith. It is not 
merely that it favors bodily health, and thus 
conduces to longevity, but it tends to bring the 
mind and soul into that tranquil state for which 
thousands and thousands sigh in vain. The 
wicked are as the troubled sea, says the Scrip- 



2SS LETTERS TO YOUXG MEN. 

ture ; and so are the faithless and skeptical. I 
have been acquainted with many skeptics ; and 
have waded through the wide sea of infidelity 
myself: and yet I can truly say. I never knew 
of any peace to the mind under this sort of 
u wick€fthaess, M 

Men of this description generally say they 
are at peace : but facts prove that it is otherwise. 
I do not refer here to their peace in death, so 
much as to their peace in life. As men live, so 
they generally die. It is not true, always, that 
death-beds are honest places, as many pretend. 
They are true, generally, to the life. If the 
life has been an honest life, the death will be 
equally so. If it has been a peaceful life, its 
termination will usually be peaceful. If faith 
has predominated during life, it will prevail in 
the horn of death. 

It is. however, the influence of principles or 
practices, or opinions on our lives, and not on 
our deaths, that I have principally to do with. 
And I say again, that a life of skepticism — 
even of skepticism in regard to parents, the 
laws or results of nature. <fcc. — is a most per- 
turbed and unhappy life. Hume and Voltaire 



RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 289 

may have been exceptions to the truth of this 
remark ; but then, too, they may not have 
been. There was a restlessness, at times, 
about the latter— a sort of desperation — that 
does not seem much like the peace of the gos- 
pel. Admit, however, the most that is claimed 
for them, in this respect ; and yet they stand 
nearly alone. Besides, these men seem not to 
have been wholly destitute of that common 
faith to which I have adverted ; and this must 
have greatly modified their skepticism in re- 
gard to God and things heavenly and divine. 

But, for one skeptic like Hume and Voltaire, 
we have thousands and tens of thousands of 
smaller ones, who, while they have no confi- 
dence in any thing in the heavens above, have 
little more in what pertains to the earth be- 
neath. Little more, did I say ? They have 
not half as much. There is vastly more skep- 
ticism in regard to ourselves and those around 
us, and especially in regard to nature and na- 
ture's laws, than there is in regard to a higher, 
and, as it is usually believed, a more culpable 
kind. 

To illustrate. Voltaire, in early life, could 



290 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN, 

invest his money in slaves and trust them to 
the winds and the ocean, and the chances of 
trade in a capricious market — and he could do 
it in confidence or faith. I do not say that he 
had no misgivings — that he never for one mo- 
ment doubted whether the elements might not 
conspire against him, or at least, whether the 
winds might not blow unpropitiously ; for this 
were more than could be expected of humani- 
ty. But I do mean to say, that with every 
drawback, and every deduction, his common 
faith in common things, was in large measure. 
I do not know how it may have been in this 
particular with Hume ; but I repeat it, one 
thing I do know — it is not so with skeptics in 
general. They are the last men to trust, or be 
trusted. Doubting and distrusting heaven, 
they doubt and distrust every thing else. They 
are timid, fearful, irresolute and capricious. 
They are fretful, moreover, beyond other men. 
There is fretfulness enough every where ; but 
it grows in richest profusion in the hot-bed of 
practical skepticism. Would a young man 
avoid the world of fretting, let him have faith, 
even though it were but worldly faith. Let 



RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 291 

him add, however, to his worldly faith, as a 
cap to the climax, the faith of the gospel. 

I have alluded to fretfulness. By this I do 
not so much refer to those outbursts which, like 
Etna and Vesuvius, do large but temporary 
mischief, as to that internal fretfulness, or con- 
tinual anxiety and worry with which our 
earth is filled. Even the professed disciple of 
Jesus Christ, too often comes much short of the 
faith and quiet of his great Master. Never 
such faith as His, and never such peace — such 
freedom from fretfulness, both internal and 
external. 

For, when and where did our great Master 
manifest fear and trembling, lest the weather 
should be unfavorable — too hot or too cold ; 
too wet or too dry ; or lest winds, seas, or mar- 
kets, should disappoint his expectations ? 
When and where did he not encourage the 
same faithfulness in others ? Nay, when or 
where did he neglect to rebuke this same 
want of faith in those around him ? Was it 
on the sea of Galilee alone that he said to the 
over-anxious, O ye of little faith? Was he 
not equally bent on portraying this ever-ap- 



292 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

pearing skepticism, when on the Mount he 
said to his disciples : Be not anxious (i. e. 
over-anxious) what ye shall eat, or what ye 
shall drink ? 

In this respect, no less than in others, is the 
young man of Nazareth worthy of being your 
model. Happy, if you attain, in any good 
measure, to his divine image. Happy if you 
have but the tithe of his practical faith. It 
will be profitable both in this life and that 
which is to come. 

Paul was a most eminent instance of the 
same virtue. For it cannot have escaped the 
notice of the most unobserving, that he was 
full of faith — at least, common faith — before 
he became a disciple of Him whom at first he 
opposed. It was his faith in God and nature 
— and finally in God's own Son — that made 
him one of the most healthy, vigorous, self-de- 
nying, enduring and happy men the world ever 
saw. 

No wonder the Bible-writers lay so much 
stress on faith. No wonder the Apostle Paul 
recounts with so much pleasure the doings 
and sufferings of those who were stoned, torn 



RELIGION AND SKEPTICISM. 293 

asunder, tempted, slain with the sword — who 
wandered about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, 
being destitute, afflicted, tormented, scourged, 
shipwrecked, killed all the day long, (fee. — 
of whom, as he says, the world was not wor- 
thy. No wonder he was himself a host in the 
cause of man and of God. So would every 
young man be, with Paul's repentance and 
faith, especially the latter. And well might 
the Apostle affirm to Timothy, that godliness 
hath promise of the life that now is, no less 
than of that which is to come. 



LETTER XXXIII. 

THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 

It is not possible to mistake, when we 
say that our young men are inclined to skep- 
ticism. The genius of our institutions, and 
the general tendencies of things, favor such a 
result. Nor is it the part of wisdom to come 
down upon the young, in a species of ven- 
geance, because they entertain doubts on 
religious subjects. It were wiser to take a 
different course. Let us rather, in the lan- 
guage of holy writ, " reason together." 

Nothing is more common than the remark 
that belief is safe, because if the truths be- 
lieved in should prove to be but the " baseless 
fabric of a vision" — a mere delusion — the 
delusion is a pleasant one ; and we shall, at 
least, be as well off in the great future as the 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 295 

opposer of Christianity; whereas, if religion 
should be true, we shall of course be safe. 
Now, such remarks as these, however common, 
appear to me not only idle, but despicable. 
One who was far from being very orthodox in 
his sentiments has said, " An honest man's the 
noblest work of God" — what, then, of a dis- 
honest man? And what but dishonesty — 
downright hypocrisy — is it to pretend to be- 
lieve what we do not believe, under the idea 
that it is safe? Safe to be dishonest — hypo- 
critical ? Perish such a sentiment ! Let it 
revert to the bottomless pit, whence it came ! 

If our religion — the Christian religion — be 
true, it ought to be sustained by proper evi- 
dence. If otherwise, if it cannot be thus 
sustained, then I, for one, say to every young 
man in the world, Reject it. God never meant 
you should receive that which you honestly 
think unworthy of your reception. You may 
not, indeed, have examined the evidence he 
has placed in your way ; and herein may be 
culpable. But I say again, it would be the 
strange administration of a still stranger sove- 
reign, who should so arrange things as to 



296 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

require his subjects to believe against their 
honest convictions, after a perfect and candid 
investigation. 

If it can be shown, to the entire satisfaction 
of my readers, that the doctrines, duties and 
graces of Christianity, in their practical appli- 
cation to daily life, as well as its institutions 
(when not perverted), are as beneficial to the 
body as to the soul — favorable, in short, to 
man's every interest, here and hereafter, is 
there not, even in this, an indication of its 
divine origin ? 

We have seen, in former articles, that the 
repentance and faith to which the Gospel calls 
us, are not unfavorable to human health and 
longevity — and that the latter is even highly 
favorable. But the Gospel requires us to add 
to our faith a long list of other qualities 01 
virtues — such as love, hope, peace, joy, tem- 
perance, purity, doing good, &c. It sanctions 
marriage, the church, the Sabbath, religious 
training, and indeed whatever may be said* to 
be pure, lovely and of good report. 

Now, if it could happen by any remarkable 
coincidence, that though Christianity was a 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 297 

fable or humbug, yet some one or two of 
these — as faith and repentance — were favor- 
able to health and longevity, it could hardly 
happen that the whole list which I have enu- 
merated would be. Such an agreement would 
be more than chance or hap-hazard. It would 
be the harmony of truth; and would be a 
strong argument, a very strong one, in favor 
of our religion. Indeed it seems to mean 
argument which few, if any, would attempt 
to gainsay or resist. 

And yet it can be shown, most clearly, that 
all the virtues above, as enjoined or sanctioned 
by Christianity, together with its doctrines and 
institutions, are as favorable to the happiness 
of mankind, even in this life, as if this state 
of probation were all ; as if our motto should 
everywhere be, " Let us eat and drink," let us 
enjoy the present moment, " for to-morrow we 
die." It is not repentance and faith alone, but 
the whole list of elevating affections and pas- 
sions. It is every thing, in short, which tends 
to make us representatives of our Lord and 
Saviour Jesus Christ. 

I shall be met here, I know, with the 

13* 



298 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

common objection — How happens it, then, if 
the graces, virtues and institutions of Chris- 
tianity are favorable to health, that so many 
of those who profess to be influenced by it, 
especially its ministers, are gloomy, sickly, or 
short-lived ? 

But this objection assumes two things as 
true which are manifest errors. First : it con- 
founds the profession of piety with the prac- 
tice of it, whereas it is too well known that 
they do not always go together. Second : It 
takes for granted that there is an efficacy in 
piety to restore immediate health and cheer- 
fulness, which none of its most zealous advo- 
cates would claim. Besides, it assumes, as 
proved, what some may well be supposed to 
deny, and what has certainly never yet been 
proved, that the piety of gospel ministers ren- 
ders them sickly. 

For nothing is plainer, with regard to Chris- 
tian ministers, than that they are badly edu- 
cated. The world is, indeed, full of misedu- 
cation — but on no class do its evils fall so 
unsparingly as on ministers. They are se- 
lected while mere boys, as a very general fact, 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 299 

from the ranks of the nervous, the scrofulous, 
the consumptive or the dyspeptic. And then 
their treatment through their whole course, is 
just such as it should be if those who direct 
their destiny were fully determined to set all 
physical law at defiance. And yet, in spite 
of all this, we have a few healthy ministers ; 
and more than a few who have health enough 
to render them exceedingly useful in their 
profession. Perhaps, as a whole, they are 
nearly as healthy as most other classes of 
men, in spite of all the unfavorable tendencies 
by which they are surrounded. 

And as to common Christians, it should not 
be forgotten that, for the most part, the voice 
of mercy is not heard by them till their health, 
though it may have been tolerable by inherit- 
ance, is ruined, or nearly so, by the various 
forms of physical and moral transgression to 
which they have been more or less subjected. 
It is not for Christianity, in these latter days 
at least, to perform miracles. It does not take 
possession of the individual in a pure or 
healthy state, but takes him as he is, deformed 
and diseased by sin, and strives to make him 



300 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

better. But the changes it works are not, in 
every instance, very rapid. The improvement 
it proffers is for the race, rather than for the 
individual. If in the present generation, but 
two per cent, be gained, it is very much. The 
next generation, with the same efforts, means 
and principles, can gain five per cent. ; the 
next ten, and so on. All-powerful as piety is, 
and even all healthy as it is, it can hardly 
elevate those angles of the mouth which have 
been depressed for a score or two of years by un- 
governable passions or by continued fretfulness. 
Nor can it smooth the brow that, by the same 
causes, has been knit for years in wrinkles 
and frowns. Nor can it change in a moment 
or a month that temperament, which, once 
happily balanced between the sanguine and 
nervous, has become deeply tinged, even to 
bilious disease, by a predominance of the an- 
gry passions. 

While, therefore, I claim for religion — the 
Christian religion I mean, of course — a power 
almost unlimited in its tendencies to health, I 
do not, I again say, claim for it any thing 
miraculous. All I maintain and hold myself 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 301 

competent to prove is, that its whole tendency, 
and the tendency of all its parts is to human 
health, and every form of temporal happiness. 
It is not given us merely to die by, it is 
equally useful to live by. If it were not so, it 
would need one more proof than we now 
possess of its superiority over Mohammedan- 
ism, or even Paganism. But if it be thus — if 
it be healthy and life-giving — if its every 
virtue and every precept are as favorable to 
the well-being of the body as to that of the 
soul, then we have an argument for its divinity 
not to be found elsewhere, and one which, as 
I have already said, is unanswerable. 

I am the more particular in stating the argu- 
ment as above, because it will be new to some, 
and also because the facts have not been in 
every instance correctly presented. The au- 
thor of "The Influence of Religion on Health," 
whom I quoted in a former letter, though a 
professed believer in Christianity, so con- 
founded Christianity pure and undefiled, with 
its abuses, and even other forms of religion 
with the true, as to leave the unhappy, and 
perhaps unintended impression, that the latter 



302 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN* 

itself was not healthful, but the contrary. 
And I most fully believe that the effect 
of this very learned and ingenious work, 
was to produce a very general belief in the 
minds of a multitude of the young, that the 
whole matter was one of very doubtful utility, 
so far, at least, as this world's happiness is 
concerned ; that if religion is useful to die by, 
it is of little consequence — rather none at all — 
to live by. In other words, its tendency was, 
as I conceive, to infidelity. 



LETTER XXXIV. 

DEATH AND FUTURITY. 

There has been almost as much speculation 
on the subject of death as on that of life. Phi- 
losophy, physiology, mesmerism and morality, 
have all failed to tell us what either is. The 
only satisfactory information we seem to have 
concerning them, is derived from the Scriptures. 

One thing we do know, however, that both 
are — that we live, and that we die. Whether 
originally designed to live a hundred, a thou- 
sand, or ten thousand years — or whether to 
die at all — is not the question. All that are 
now on the stage of human existence — all that 
have been born — must sooner or later die. It 
is a warfare from which there is no discharge. 

Some tell us that the time, manner, place, 



304 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

&c, of our death, are of no consequence ; that 
as we live, so we shall die. That if we live 
well we shall die well ; but that if we live ill, 
we must die ill. At least this is, as they say, 
the general rule. 

Others make every thing of the circum- 
stances connected with death. They measure 
a person's spiritual worth almost wholly by 
the manner of his exit. If he dies in agitation, 
or fear, they set him down as a bad man ; but 
if he dies joyfully — in expectation of heaven — 
then there is hope in his death. 

Just views on this subject would probably 
lead us midway between these two extremes. 
It is true on the one hand, that as we live, 
so are we apt to die ; but it is equally true, 
that a happy death-bed is desirable. Who 
does not love to see the sun set pleasantly? 
Who does not love to be happy and to see 
others happy in all the circumstances and 
events of existence — and is not death one of 
them? 

I counsel you, my dear friends, to entertain 
just views of death and dying. Not that it 
may cast a gloom over your feelings ; but for 



DEATH AND FUTURITY. 305 

the very reason that it may not. It is not they 
who never think of death — but always shrink 
from it — during life, that die with the most 
composure; but those as a general rule who 
make it a subject of frequent reflection. 

Death is not, of course, the blotting out of 
any of our powers. It is, at most, a change. 
Job calls it a change of countenance. Is it 
much more ? We are not sure — quite sure — 
that even the body ceases to be. Most look 
for a resurrection — the reunion of soul and 
body — and not a few suppose they are to have, 
in the resurrection, not merely a body, but the 
body; — the very same body which they lay 
down in the grave. 

I shall not of course enter upon any discus- 
sion of this great subject, though it might be 
interesting. All I contend for now, is, that 
death is only a change ; and so far as we can 
see, a slight one. It is merely the putting on 
of immortality. It is, as it were, the fabled 
Styx which we must cross. It is the gate 
that leads to the celestial city — at least if ever 
we arrive there. It opens to us the portals of 



306 



LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 



the eternal world, whether we are to be happy- 
there, or miserable. 

I have said that death is a change — but of 
what? Is it a change of character, or even 
accompanied or immediately followed by any 
such change? This is a belief into which 
some young men fall. But beware of such a 
fallacy. As the tree falls, so it lies ; whether 
towards the north or towards the south, where 
it falls, there it shall be. 

Many solace themselves, now-a-days, with 
the idea that a great and beneficial change 
passes upon all men, as soon as they " pass the 
bounds of time and space.' 7 But is it neces- 
sary for me to say that such a notion accords 
as ill with reason, as with Revelation ? Need 
I repeat what I have said elsewhere, that no 
miracle will be wrought at death, or subse- 
quently, to make you fit for a state of happi- 
ness for which you have not with God's help 
already prepared yourselves ? 

Is death a change of place ? This we can- 
not certainly know. The idea of passing the 
bounds of time and space, in the last para- 
graph, is a poet's idea, and not a Christian's. 



DEATH AND FUTURITY. 307 

We know not whether heaven and hell are all 
around us, so to speak,— a world within a 
world — as chariots and horses were round 
about the man in the days of Elijah and Eli- 
sha, though he saw them not till his eyes were 
opened ; and we know not, on the other hand, 
but there are literally mansions for the blessed 
as well as dungeons or pits for the miserable. 
Our modern theology that would teach us 
heaven and hell are holy and unholy charac- 
ters — states, and not places — may be little 
more true than that of a thousand years ago, 
which taught of streets literally paved with 
gold on one hand, and a literal lake of fire on 
the other. Future ages may learn, perchance, 
not to be wise on this subject, above what is 
written. 

Let us, then, return to our first position. 
" Thou changest his countenance, and sendest 
him away," said the ancient ; and this is 
nearly all which is known of change at death 
to the moderns. The mode of our existence — 
the externals of it — are changed ; let us stop 
at this point, and study humility before we 
proceed further. 



308 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

One thing we do know, however, that we 
are made susceptible of everlasting and incon- 
ceivable progress, both intellectually and mor- 
ally — it may be physically. And what we 
are made capable of, we have sufficient motive 
to become. We know not yet what we shall 
be, said the beloved John to his spiritual breth- 
ren. And may I not, in my own humble 
sphere and way, say the same thing to you ? 

You are ambitious ; — I had almost said, you 
ought to be. Certainly you were made to soar 
aloft in pursuit of something. Your noble 
nature was never given that you might creep 
like the serpent and lick the dust. "Man 
must soar," said the poet Young. And is it 
not so ? Is he worthy the name of man who 
is so degraded as not to desire to rise, and rise, 
and rise, where Gabriel and Raphael, in their 
upward flight, are yet strangers ? But I have 
said enough of this in other letters. 

This is a world of preparation; a world 
where we are to learn the first rudiments of 
the art of flying amid the hosts of heaven, and, 
as connected by faith with the Author of the 
Christian scheme, of rising higher than any 



DEATH AND FUTURITY. 309 

other created beings. Here we are first to 
spread those pinions, which after death are to 
become free and full of immortality. 

Now every act of your lives, however small, 
bears in this view upon your eternal progress 
in knowledge and happiness. It is, however, 
one thing to know, and quite another to love 
and obey, and enjoy the reward of obedience. 
It is one thing to fly upward, with increasing 
speed through everlasting ages, a missionary 
of good to all; and another to fly into thicker 
and yet thicker darkness and ignominy, 
through ages interminable, dragging down- 
ward at the same time as many others as you 
can. Satan knows enough — but alas ! Satan 
is Satan still, despite of knowledge. He has 
been so for thousands of past years, he will 
doubtless be so for thousands of ages to 
come. 

Will you not, then, think much concerning 
the future ? I do not ask you to think much 
of death, though I dare not counsel you to 
overlook it. But I ask you — I urge you — 
mainly to think of life. Oh, this Life ! I 
sometimes wonder what death is, and heave a 



310 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

sigh on account of it. For once, however, 
that I think of death, and sigh, I think a 
hundred times of life. Oh, the responsibility 
of living — and of living on eternally — and of 
eternally living for others ! 

Have you thought much on this subject? 
You have thought no doubt of California. 
You have even thought of going thither. But 
why ? Is it not because you seek happiness ? 
And yet it is a long way to California — its 
golden sands are all to you in the future — -to 
gain them will cost you weeks and months of 
preparation, and perhaps of privation. You 
know this ; you knew it when you first 
thought of California, and half resolved to 
go there. Did preparation or privation much 
daunt you ? Or was it the uncertainty of all 
things ? 

But suppose this uncertainty were all re- 
moved. Suppose that by one year, or even 
two or three of preparation, you could be sure of 
success. Suppose you could know that after 
a probation of three years — a mere subsistence 
and many trials — you could dig from the valley 
of the Sacramento and bring to your own home 



DEATH AND FUTURITY. 311 

$100,000. Would the long preparation at all 
daunt you ? 

Let me, then, direct you to a land as much 
more desirable than California, as a means of 
making you happy, as can well be conceived. 
Think of a land 1500 miles square, so abound- 
ing in gold that its streets are paved with it ! A 
land, too, of which, with all its gold, you 
may have full possession after a few short 
years of preparation, and without any real 
privation at all. 

Is not such a land desirable ? I have 
spoken as if you might become its sole pos- 
sessor. But I mean not quite so much. A 
different law obtains in that bright abode, 
from what obtains just now in California. In 
the latter place the great strife at present is to 
be richer than the rest ; and every increase of 
one's own wealth above that of others, though 
it sets them at a greater distance from him, 
seems to add to his happiness. That is to 
say he is neither happy nor rich in proportion 
as he sees others rise, and aids them in the 
work of progress, but exactly the reverse. 

Whereas in the new city of which I have 



312 LETTERS TO YOUNG MEN. 

spoken, every one is richer and happier in 
proportion as others are made rich. Instead, 
moreover, of but one king, there all are kings 
and priests, and that for ever and ever. In- 
stead of a contest who shall rule and reign, 
whether gold or strength, the great question 
is who shall serve most, and most effectually. 

Is not this golden city — this New Jerusalem 
— worthy of your highest aspirations and 
highest efforts ? Will you not, then, take 
right views of Death and Futurity? And 
knowing in what consists your highest in- 
terest and the will of God, and that these are 
in everlasting harmony, will you not be wise 
—wise for time and wise for eternity ? 



END. 



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